Roommate’s sudden frenzy made Sigmund hesitate for a split second, but his technique was still sharp. He smashed both ambushing Knight Puchi away. One of them was even cleaved in half. Its final self-destruction was blocked by a blood shield that rose in time.
"Why?"
Only then did Sigmund ask in his mind.
"Get that Puchi. As long as you bring me that Puchi, I will give you more time in control of the body every day."
The roommate gave no explanation. He only threw out a very tempting offer.
What was that seemingly ordinary Puchi hiding?
What was its connection to this roommate, who always disguised his soul’s appearance as a Puchi?
Sigmund’s heart was full of questions, but he forced them down and cleared his thoughts.
The urgent task was to deal with Alama in front of him.
Win this battle and Alama’s daughter and that Puchi would all fall into his hands anyway.
He swung his blade toward the staggering Alama, who had just lost an arm.
At that moment, a fierce aura exploded beside him.
The Knight Puchi he had knocked back earlier shot forward again, much faster than before. Its mycelial tendrils spun at high speed, turning into a dense storm of blade-whips that cut across Sigmund’s path and blocked the strike aimed at Alama.
Sigmund had to change moves again. He reversed his grip and put all his strength into a slash that met the blade-whip storm head on.
The scene he expected did not happen.
The blade grated against the tendrils. The sound of tearing set teeth on edge.
Two tendrils were cut, but the Puchi used the recoil to flip back and land. Only a deep gash showed on its cap.
"Hall tier?"
Sigmund’s heart shook.
A few days ago, if someone had told him there existed a hall tier Puchi, he would have thought they were insane.
Now the absurd reality stood before him.
What shocked him even more was that in the brief pause, the severed tendrils and the gash on its body writhed wildly. The mycelium regrew at a speed visible to the naked eye.
"Regeneration faster than a troll?"
That overturned everything he knew.
It was still not enough.
The absurdity only made him more eager to end this fight. He did not want to see any more surprises.
"Blood Control, Hundred Arms."
This move was greatly weakened against someone holding the Sunstone, but it was more than enough against a hall tier Puchi.
The blood covering the battlefield surged toward him, then shaped itself.
Blades, spears, swords, halberds, axes, hammers.
Countless weapons of solidified blood formed at once. It was as if an invisible army had raised them. They turned into a storm of killing steel and crashed toward the Knight Puchi from all directions.
The Puchi moved with all the speed it had, blade-whips spinning to their limit. It dodged and parried inside the blood storm.
Metallic clangs rang without pause. Chitin fragments and mycelial shreds flew everywhere.
Then a blood dagger pierced through the defense and stabbed into the Puchi’s backside.
Its movements froze.
The next wave of attacks swallowed it whole.
In the space of a single breath, that powerful hall tier Puchi was torn into drifting scraps of mycelium.
From the Knight Puchi’s ambush to its total destruction, the entire exchange had lasted less than a minute.
But that minute was enough.
In the distance, tears in her eyes, Inanna had already reached the Sunstone greatsword lying on the ground, its light dimmed.
She did not hesitate. She used all her strength to lift the heavy blade, then pressed the glowing Sunstone firmly against the body of the one Knight Puchi she still had.
The wind rose.
[Retainer Maker]
A low roar swept through the valley.
Without warning, a terrifying whirlwind appeared in the narrow gorge. It lifted shattered stone and misted blood into the air.
The first to sense the coming disaster were the mages on both sides. They were the ones most sensitive to mana.
In their perception, the mana in Dragonroar Valley, which had been as tangled as a ball of thread, was now seized by the storm and dragged toward its center in a crazed rush.
On the ground, every piece of Puchi remains, dead or alive, and every patch of fungal mat on the cliffs, everything created from Lin Jun’s power, ripped free from earth and stone as if drawn by an enormous magnet. All of it soared up and poured into the growing vortex.
Mana was compressed. Mycelium was forcibly recombined.
Under countless horrified gazes, a shadow large enough to blot out the moons slowly took shape in the heart of the chaos.
Puchi.
A colossal monster that almost plugged the entire valley appeared at the center of the battlefield. Every demon soldier had to crane their neck as far as they could just to see it.
Its round cap almost touched both cliffs. Its shadow swallowed a wide stretch of ground. Even the light of the three moons above was blocked.
"What is that thing?"
A demon soldier’s spear trembled in his hands.
"A b… beast class Puchi?"
An officer muttered. His face showed disbelief and fear.
"So big."
The sight was so far beyond imagination that even this battlefield, which had been roaring a moment before, fell silent for an instant.
Only the crackle of flames and the groans of the wounded remained.
Even Inanna, who had triggered all of this, stared blankly at the mountain-like back of the giant Puchi. Her lips parted slightly, but no sound came out.
She only snapped out of it when Lin Jun’s reminder sounded in her mind. She rushed toward the fallen Alama, trying to drag him out of danger.
"Do not even think about it."
Sigmund’s eyes went cold. He swept his hand and a volley of solid blood spears ripped through the air toward Inanna’s back.
The colossal Puchi’s body shifted sideways. It moved like a walking fortress and slid between Inanna and the spears.
A massive tendril, thicker than a troll’s waist, lashed out with a roar of air.
There was a deafening impact.
Blood spears and tendril exploded together. Dark red blood and shredded mycelium rained down.
In the next instant, the broken end of the tendril seethed. Mycelium wove together and restored it in the blink of an eye.
On the other side, the scattered blood gathered again under Sigmund’s control and turned back into weapons.
With a heavy puchi sound, the giant Puchi stepped forward.
In front of it, an unconvinced troll roared and swung an ironbound club at its foot. A spray of shredded mycelium burst out on impact.
The attack meant nothing. The giant Puchi’s round foot did not even pause. It came down and crushed the troll into the ground along with his roar.
Among the demon ranks, some goblins completely lost their nerve in front of this incomprehensible monster. They turned and fled, stumbling over their own feet.
Even the braver soldiers felt sweat in their palms as they gripped their weapons and looked up at that bulk.
Sigmund was not among the frightened.
For all its size, he had seen abyssal beasts larger than this.
The sight still shook his understanding, but his instincts as a fighter did not slow.
Blood flared. A dozen newly formed blood weapons turned into streaks of crimson and slammed into the giant Puchi’s left foot.
The monster’s body lurched forward, like a collapsing mountain falling toward the demon soldiers below. Screams of panic rose at once.
It did not fall.
Four massive tendrils braced against the cliffs on either side, holding up its tilting body.
Sigmund attacked again. Another dozen blood weapons shot out, targeting the two tendrils on its left.
Explosions rang again and again. The tendrils were blasted apart.
Even so, the giant Puchi managed to keep its balance. Within a few breaths, its shattered left foot had regrown enough to plant firmly on the ground.
[Giant Trait LV5]
[Life Source]
[Regeneration LV7]
[Mycelial Reconstruction LV8]
[Crystal Symbiosis LV8] (Inherited from the dead Knight Puchi)
Watching the tendrils roil and regrow, Sigmund finally felt trouble pressing down.
"All troops, listen. Focus fire, attack."
His shout snapped the demons out of their shock.
Swords and axes chopped. Arrows flew. Spell lights of many colors flared and poured down like rain on the giant Puchi’s massive body.
Compared to Sigmund’s attacks, ordinary soldiers were worlds apart.
Fireballs only left black scorch marks on the cap.
Half-demons slashed with all their strength, but their blades sunk deep and got stuck in the mycelium.
Even the best archers’ arrows only buried themselves halfway and could not pierce through.
The giant Puchi ignored it. It did not even seem to feel the itching.
It only continued its heavy, slow steps.
In the cramped gorge, that alone forced the entire demon line to keep retreating.
Behind it, Inanna was shouting for the human soldiers to fall back into the valley.
A few agile bloodborn and half-demons tried to use their speed to slip past the Puchi.
[Subsonic Wave Attack LV9]
An invisible destructive force swept out from the giant Puchi.
The low-frequency wave bounced between the cliffs, stacking on itself, its power surging higher.
Some human soldiers who did not get clear in time spat blood and dropped.
The demons closer to the Puchi suffered worse.
Within several dozen meters around the monster, all demons, whether charging skirmishers or shielded heavies, fell in swaths. They collapsed without a sound.
Blood leaked from eyes, ears, nose, and mouth. Their organs had been shaken to a pulp. It was unclear who was dead and who was alive.
Even Sigmund took the hit. He was too close and completely unprepared. His throat burned. Two streaks of blood spilled from the corners of his mouth.
He quickly raised a circulating blood shield around himself. Only then did he block further damage from the sound waves.
The eerie scene crushed what was left of the demons’ morale.
Already shaken by the giant, now they barely attacked at all.
"Do not retreat."
Sigmund wiped the blood from his lips.
"Regeneration that strong must burn energy. Burn it out. Use fire. Use acid. Hurt it until it cannot grow back."
Under his orders, the demon onslaught grew fierce again.
Barrels of oil were hurled forward. Enchanted flames clung and burned along the mycelium. Corrosive spells fell and hissed where they struck.
At that moment, the giant Puchi did something strange.
Its huge body slowly lowered itself and finally sat down like a small mountain.
"Out of energy?"
A demon officer, hopeful, drew his bow faster.
Out of sight under the Puchi’s bulk, the Knight Puchi that had pried off the Sunstone slipped away through the cover of the giant body. It dropped into the underground network and began to crawl away at speed.
Once that was done, Lin Jun kindly screamed a reminder in Sigmund’s mind.
"Little West, run."
"What? Do not tell me."
Sigmund guessed at what might come.
His bad feeling proved right very quickly.
A terrifying surge of power built up inside the silent giant Puchi.
It felt like a volcano about to erupt, holding a force that could tear the world apart.
Even Velariss, still fighting hard on the heights above, turned her head at the pressure.
Sigmund, closest to it, saw his pupils shrink to pinpoints. He pulled every drop of blood he could in front of himself.
A deafening blast shook the valley.
(End of Chapter)
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