Chapter 1238 (1/2)

No… I can’t be party to this…

Captain Rebecca Loft had just clenched her fists and resolved herself to finally ignore the missive from her superiors; she was going to pull back her squad. That was the moment when the monster descended from Shadowthorn Peak.

At first, it was just a dark blur that crashed into the last low ridge between her and the forces of the Republic. And then the impacted ground buckled and produced a huge wave of dust and debris that blasted outward. Rebecca crouched down to maintain her balance as the ridge beneath her groaned ominously. But luckily it seemed that the ground wouldn’t collapse beneath her. So Rebecca looked up and squinted toward the source of the disturbance.

There were seven seconds of silence as the dust slowly drifted to the ground. The darkness at the epicenter seemed to darken every moment. Then the screams started.

Thick blue veins pulsed visibly on the huge monster’s pale chest. It seemed to be animated by a strange glowing light that burned in the flesh of its torso. It’s eyes were dark, the dark green of peat mud and shadows across still water. The dark green of fungus growing on a corpse. Licking its lips, the enormous monster seemed to pause to stare directly at Rebecca. A thick wave of miasma billowed outward as it straightened and towered over the surroundings, abruptly lowering the temperature of the surrounding area.

For a split second, Rebecca was squeezed by fear. Then she managed to force out a shrill, “R-retreat!”

But simultaneously to Rebecca’s yell, one of the operators of the furnace artillery appeared to be so panicked by this monster that he activated his engine of war; a burning orb of scrap metal and serrated edges arced forward.

Is this thing a secret weapon of the Republic- no, they are frozen too, Rebecca’s eyes flicked to the arrayed forces of the Republic and then to the flaming projectile heading toward the monster. Then… perhaps this thing is the source of the miasma…? The Paragons that now provide us benefits did say there were many secrets hidden in this world…

Although her soldiers hadn’t heard her order, Rebecca didn’t yet repeat it. She was just like all the others at this moment; everyone silently watched as the orb shot toward the monster. Oblivious to the oncoming attack, the monster raised its head and howled. More and more miasma was pouring out to drench the surrounding area.

It would have been one thing if this ten-story monster had blocked the projectile or smashed it to pieces. But it was an altogether more sinister horror to witness the monster completely ignore the projectile as it streaked forward. The flaming orb that had enough power to destroy a stone wall two meters thick impacted the monster’s side without much fanfare. The dense metal ball crumpled and fell to the ground without leaving a mark on the monster’s skin.

The howling stopped. The huge monster with its terribly dark eyes lowered its head and turned. Its raptor-like legs shook the ground as it slowly pivoted and looked out toward the forces of the Armgrast Empire. It’s eyes began to glow as it raised the sharp bone protrusion that jutted out from its right arm.

With much more vehemence this time, Rebecca bellow, “RETREAT!”

Unwilling to let another chance to flee pass, the forces of the Armgrast Empire twisted around and dashed away without any semblance of discipline. These were all elites that were around Level 50, but those Levels seemed small things before this huge monster riding a tidal wave of miasma.

Moving more quickly than such a large monster had any right to, the thing swiped its bone protrusion forward, bisecting the engine of war that had launched the attack. But that bone spear also dragged along the ground to follow through on its swipe and ripped open a looming fissure at the base of the ridge. Within a second, that opening sprayed upward even more miasma. Visibility plummeted.

As the ridge began to collapse beneath her, Captain Rebecca Loft pumped both arms and sprinted like her life depended on it.

*****

After putting the fear of ‘god’ in both of the assembled armies and making them retreat, Randidly returned to his human form and produced his Philosopher’s Key. Unsure how long the lesson of the Grim Chimera would stick, he flooded the area with Miasma and then used the key to ‘lock’ the passage between the two large countries.

Because the mountain range was not quite a threshold in the traditional sense, the lock was relatively weak. But without a specialized squad of soldiers with very high resistance to Nether, Randidly doubted that the two countries would chance the passage for the next few months. Hopefully giving time for the six individuals to straighten out the situation.

Pausing after he finished, Randidly looked at the Philosopher’s Key with a thoughtful expression on his face. Truly, as a Philosopher, my role sometimes causes me to be misunderstood. I might open and close doors, but very rarely will the results of my work be associated with my name. In some ways, it’s as though everyone else will miss the owner and only see the key…

After saying the lofty statement about himself, Randidly looked intently at the Philosopher’s Key. There was no notification. Randidly could only sigh and shake his head. If reaching Level 100 in a Fate was that easy, it would honestly be strange. But still, he supposed it was worth a shot.

Randidly stayed in the area a little longer to make sure both armies retreated and was relieved to see that aside from a few sentries left to monitor the mountain range, both completely withdrew. Which meant that Randidly could finally go to accomplish the two things he had actually intended to do when he entered into his Soulskill.

The first was to pay a visit to Wendy. But Randidly was rather stunned to be stonewalled by sharp-looking secretary with the name tag ‘Bjorn” when Randidly arrived at Wendy’s company.