181 – Paradise – 1

For a Summoned who had reached Legendary-grade, it was not easy to grow further from there.

It was difficult to obtain proper experience points by hunting ordinary monsters, and the same was true for quests.

That was why many wandered in search of ‘secret realms’ where monsters of Legendary-grade or higher were guaranteed to appear, and it was for the same reason that they clung desperately to the unexplored lands of the continent to find something new.

“But why does a Legendary-grade appear everywhere we go…?”

Immediately after Eun-shin barely hid himself to escape the maw of the earthworm, which was pitch-black like an abyss, the creature ambushed the group of intruders from behind and swallowed nearly half of them.

The absurd thing was that the Legendary-grade debuff ability user, the core of the group, was included among them.

Could he really have died just like that? Everyone harbored the same thought even as they threw their bodies to avoid the earthworm—but the ability user never showed himself again.

Perhaps he had exerted his ability to the maximum as he died, for the earthworm’s movements slowed down slightly, but that was all.

“Unbelievable! To think the ‘Rusted Tombstone’ was taken out in a single breath…!”

It was funny how they called each other by pretty cool-sounding epithets, but right now, a rusting tombstone was not the problem.

Originally, Gi-jun had planned to let the boss monster of this dungeon attack the assailants from behind, while he mobilized his party members to form an encirclement to prevent them from escaping.

However, because that lava earthworm was devouring everything in the space it passed through, there was no leeway to create an encirclement or anything else.

The only saving grace was that the earthworm, having missed Eun-shin, targeted the nearby assailants first, but looking at the current situation, it did not seem like they would hold out very long.

For the ground and the ceiling were collapsing simultaneously in the wake of the earthworm’s movements!

“Maybe it’s a chain reaction?”

Tilla said calmly, crushing all the boulders falling from the ceiling with her whip.

“A chain reaction starting from when Jun first hunted a divine beast.”

Because Gi-jun had hunted the divine beast Hati, Skoll, who had stayed quietly in the volcano for a long time, showed an abnormal reaction.

Because of that, the suppressed false god, the Pupil, had also begun to act.

And once Gi-jun and his party members cleaned up those two, this time the lava earthworm did—.

“I can understand the Pupil, but the earthworm appearing this strong is just out of nowhere!”

“The lava it ate and grew up on must have been special!”

The two of them moved their bodies frantically even while sharing a conversation.

Gi-jun used his two shields to deflect the rocks flying from all directions, simultaneously keeping the earthworm in check with the powers of Lucy and Ur; meanwhile, Tilla, while checking the escape route and guiding the party members, threw intense flames at the assailants to confirm each kill one by one.

“You son of a— Aaargh!”

Meanwhile, the situation of the assailants was as follows.

Those who had lost half their members as soon as they appeared and had retreated in panic finally began to fight back upon realizing that the lava earthworm was completely targeting them, but because all the surviving members were thief types suited only for backstabbing others, they could not inflict any proper damage on the earthworm that was driving forward with unstoppable force.

The same was true for the remaining Legendary-grade assailant—the hunter—who was armed with all kinds of magical tools, daggers, crossbows, and the like, but while they could pierce into the earthworm’s body and inflict wounds, they could not land a fatal blow.

“Those bastards, they knew about the ambush— Ugh!”

They had already known long ago.

The more the hunter fought the earthworm with all his might, the more the earthworm writhed and thrashed its entire body.

Naturally, the collapse accelerated, and those who had been lucky enough to survive until then all met an end fitting for themselves.

Would the ground sink like this and bury everyone?

Just as he was wondering how to protect his party members in that situation, a message arrived from Biche, resolving his question.

“It really was a chain reaction, this.”

“Right?”

Tilla proudly whipped the air.

The tip coiled in the air and suddenly yanked something, which turned out to be Eun-shin, who had been hiding his presence.

“*Pant*, *pant*, thanks for the help, Ms. Scintilla…”

“Good job.”

Gi-jun asked, tossing a towel pulled from his inventory to the sweating youth.

“What did you touch to make it like that?”

“It was strange from the moment I found it. Shed skins of dead earthworms were scattered around, and it was squirming in a fit of rage.”

“I see…”

Gi-jun closed his eyes and sighed.

According to Biche’s message, the monster earthworms she was dealing with had evolved bizarrely after absorbing the power of an existence called an ‘Outer God.’

If the earthworms here were of a similar kind, it was highly probable that after gaining power by feeding on the energy of the false god for a long time, they had experienced an abnormality when they consumed the lava imbued with the divine power of Ptah, who had driven the false god out and come to rule the volcano.

“So it wasn’t just a matter of accepting a god’s power, but rather that absorbing the powers of two gods with different attributes became the problem, causing the mutation?”

As expected of Tilla, whose experience in Leta was not for show, she clearly summarized the situation.

“Yeah, and uncannily, we entered this dungeon right at the timing when the mutation finished.”

The only saving grace was that there was no other earthworm that had mutated so bizarrely.

Perhaps the other earthworms had died from being unable to withstand the shock of the mutation—or this guy had devoured all of its own kind to evolve into the strongest irregular, like a gu.

“To think in a place like this, a mere— *Ack*!”

—Fufu, I cannot yield the finishing blow.

Gi-jun let out a sigh as he watched the evil spirit suddenly plunge into the back of the hunter’s head, who was on the verge of death, and land the finishing blow.

The other assailants, who had struggled desperately to survive by any means, had already been swallowed as prey by the earthworm or had lost their lives helplessly to the snipes of Tilla and Lora.

In other words, all of those numerous assailants were dead.

“Then it’s my turn now.”

“…Jun, you aren’t planning to fight, are you? There is no way we can conduct a proper battle when the ground and ceiling are collapsing. It would be better to escape from here, reach the surface, and intercept it there.”

It was a reasonable point, but it was also something Gi-jun could not accept.

“Who knows what that guy will do if it gets outside. It’s best to stop it here. And if it’s me, I can probably stop it.”

Gi-jun roughly cleared away the stones filled all around and scanned his surroundings.

As they continuously pushed back, fell, and fled due to the earthworm running rampant and collapsing the surroundings, they eventually reached a place where the ground was quite solid; upon confirming that shed earthworm skins were scattered everywhere, he cast a glance at Eun-shin, and the youth nodded in reply.

“It’s where that guy originally was.”

Sure enough, they had ultimately entered the boss room.

Though he sighed in disbelief, Gi-jun stepped forward immediately.

Just then, the earthworm, enraged at having its last prey stolen by the evil spirit, opened its mouth wide and swallowed the estoc.

“Huh?”

—I wish she would die like that.

He was about to say something in response to Lucy’s earnest prayer, but held back.

Even though everything else besides her had been eaten and killed by the earthworm, he somehow felt that if it was the evil spirit, she would emerge alive as if nothing had happened.

“I hope she brings out some treasure from inside.”

—Contractor, that’s just nonsense… Contractor?!

Gi-jun charged straight toward the earthworm, which was trying to rampage again.

Dodging the boulders falling from all directions and deflecting a few of them, Gi-jun dashed without slowing down in the slightest.

He thrust the Silver Moon of Contradiction, reinforced with Adamant, to the front, and activated Moonlight Blood Fangs to cover it once more with a blood-colored energy.

“Come at me!”

—Kuaaaaagh!

The creature opened its mouth, prepared to swallow even Gi-jun whole.

But right after sensing Gi-jun’s sharply rising energy, it shut its maw tightly, as if startled and terrified by something.

Naturally, Gi-jun collided head-on with its face—grinding away its facial skin and, beyond that, smashing the countless saw-like sharp teeth growing inside its mouth.

He had smashed everything in his path of charge, just as the earthworm had done.

—*Crunch!*

—Kyahaaaaak!

The sight of the lava earthworm’s teeth scattering was like snow fluttering in the air.

Having achieved his primary goal, Gi-jun immediately pulled back, but he felt a bizarre suction force generating from within the lava earthworm’s body, attempting to pull him in.

Reflexively, he transformed his shield into fangs, drove them into the ground, and held on, but it felt as though his body would float up into the air at any moment.

“It’s practically a vacuum cleaner…!”

—Are you going to be okay, Contractor?

“Of course, *whew*, obviously.”

Honestly, he felt that if he let his guard down even a little, he would be dragged straight inside.

However, since he could not summon Fortis inside here to create a headwind, the only remaining method was…

He raised the shield held in his other hand, the King of the Well, and aimed its tip past the lava earthworm’s maw, which was as deep as an abyss.

“I seem to make good use of this whenever something happens, so maybe I really should look for a wind spirit.”

—Didn’t that dwarf say he would make a wind-attribute artifact useful as an evil dragon’s wing?

It would be nice if he did, but…

The lighthearted banter in this urgent situation was short-lived; soon, the ground Gi-jun had driven his shield into tore away, flesh and all, and his body floated into the air!

—Contractor!

“Now!”

At the exact moment Lucy’s light amplified the King of the Well to the limit, the wind violently blasted from a single point, overcoming the lava earthworm’s suction and violently propelling Gi-jun’s body in the opposite direction.

Gi-jun immediately wrapped Lucy’s spirit power around his body and dashed forward, escaping from the creature’s mouth.

“*Phew!*”

As he escaped the lava earthworm’s mouth, covered in its flesh, tooth dust, and bodily fluids, a massive fireball flew in as if taking his place, sucked straight into the creature’s maw.

“Just die!”

—Khaaaaak!

A baptism of flames from Tilla, who was unusually furious.

Mysteriously, her flames, which had dealt little damage until now, were now all sucked into the lava earthworm’s body for some reason, visibly burning its body fiercely from the inside.

—It seems that guy exerts that suction force the moment it consumes something. The inside is probably a separate sub-space. It must have wrapped itself in thick hide to protect that sub-space…

Seeing that, Lucy finally succeeded in analyzing its weakness.

—But the moment it tried to swallow the Contractor, the Flame Human’s flames flew in instead, so it ended up swallowing them just like that.

“That’s enough explanation. I can just think of it as revealing its weakness by materializing only at the moment of attack. And because Tilla’s attack landed a proper critical hit, it is exposed to the weakness and getting beaten up.”

—You figured it out right away, Contractor?

“Who else but Tilla could do it…”

—What do you mean by that, Contractor?

“Nothing, I was just saying Tilla’s dragon fist is strong.”

—Dragon fist?

Now that he had figured out the strategy against the creature, unfortunately, there was no longer any need for Gi-jun to step forward.

At the sight of the lava earthworm swallowing Gi-jun—though to be precise, Gi-jun had crawled into its mouth himself—Tilla, who was extremely enraged, poured out flames recklessly; thus, the divine flames sucked entirely into the creature’s body caused a violent explosion according to her will, completely shattering it.

“S-Scary…”

“So that is the power of a true Legendary-grade…”

Eun-shin and Lora, who had been too busy fleeing in panic, seemed to realize her ability anew as they watched the flames Tilla released.

However, they both seemed to forget that the earthworm was a monster that had eaten two Legendary-grade Summoned just moments ago.

The fact that its weakness was exploited played a role, but it was largely because Tilla’s flames acted fatally against it.

There was no way the earthworm, which had a weakness to light despite having lava as its staple diet, could withstand Tilla’s flames, which shone hotter and brighter than anything else.

—Kiiiiiiiiik!

Finally uttering a death throe, the earthworm collapsed on the spot.

“Jun!”

Turning around the moment she confirmed the creature was neutralized, Tilla shouted sharply.

“What were you thinking, going straight into the earthworm’s mouth like that!”

“The outside looked hard to attack. And if it got really dangerous, I could escape using the power of the boots… I’m sorry.”

“You made me worry.”

She hugged Gi-jun, letting out a sigh of relief.

However, there was something that disrupted the atmosphere, which seemed ready to display “—fin—” at the bottom right of the screen, and it was the earthworm sprawled out like a corpse.

—Guoo… ooooo…

“Ah, come to think of it, did the experience points not come in?”

“Huh? No, but the achievement that I killed it…”

The moment Tilla turned back in response to Gi-jun’s muttering voice.

The earthworm’s massive body began to contract while emitting a brilliant glow.