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Chapter 136: Kinu vs Astrue ②

The weapon Astrue took out of her magic bag was a bright red whip.

It seems that her fighting style is to attack with magic and use the whip to restrain and defend. Thus far, I’ve managed to deal with her attacks with my Flame Blade and twin swords, but it was difficult to close the distance.

I was the only one who took damage in the offensive exchange that lasted for several minutes. Cuts and bruises appeared on my hands and feet. My HP had been reduced by about 30%. It seems that Astrue wasn’t just boasting about her strength.

However, I didn’t feel the sense of pressure or danger that I felt when confronting Zoa. I haven’t used any healing yet, so I want to deal in a good bit of damage while she’s still underestimating me. Let’s try changing the attack pattern a bit.

「【Flash】.」

「Uh…」

Aiming for the opening of an attack that came in an instant, I activated my light-attribute magic. A flash of light brightened the entire surroundings.

It’s a magic that doesn’t do any direct damage, but in night battles, you can’t take countermeasures for this magic unless you were already expecting it. I can simply close my eyes when I use this magic to avoid being temporarily blinded.

However, Astrue seemed to be quite accustomed to combat. Although I was able to land several follow-up attacks, she immediately reconstructed her magic barrier and flew into the sky.

「Almost.」

「That was a nasty attack! Ah, my eyes still can’t see anything…」

Astrue slowly came down, holding her right hand against the corner of her eye. This attack seems to be quite effective, but it’s hard to land follow up attacks if she escapes into the sky.

Hmm, it looks like I’ll need to take her by surprise in a different way.

「I’m gonna get scolded by Brakylls if I take too long. Sorry little girl, but I’ll have to get serious now.」

As soon as she said that, her atmosphere changed. There was no verbal activation, but it was probably a buff. The speed at which she was approaching me had clearly improved.

「Kuh… [Fox Fire].」

I immediately activated an automatic defense fire magic, but Astrue’s attack was too fierce. Erasing my magic barrier and four fox fires, her whip and wind cutters reduced my remaining HP to about 20%.

「This is the end!」

She activated Cyclone, and I was once again trapped in a wall of storm. I was able to put up my magic barrier again, but at this rate I’ll be overwhelmed.

I have no other choice now…

「[FireFox Transformation] [Firestorm].」

While activating my second buff skill, I also manifested a firestorm to destroy the cyclone swirling around me.

However, the magic manifested in a fundamentally different way from what I had used up until now.

The fire-attribute magic I’ve used so far has been orange like the setting sun, but the magic I just cast was a beautiful blue flame.

In contrast to the color that felt cold at first glance, the heat waves I felt on the skin indicated an incomparable amount of heat. The blue flames burst forth thunderously.

The tail which I only had one of in my human form was now eight and had grown much longer in my fox form. Furthermore, all of them were wrapped in blue flames. But I didn’t feel the heat. So this is the physical change of the FireFox Transformation…

「【Healing】.」

I used Healing skill to recover the HP that had been depleted, but the recovery amount was about 3 times the normal amount. About half of my total HP had been recovered. I couldn’t help but be surprised by this.

I healed once again to recover all my HP, turned off Firestorm, and faced Astrue.

「What the hell is that magic! Or rather, you… Who are you!?」

「I am Kinu, the partne– …the lover of the man who will eventually become the strongest in the world.」

「…What are you talking about…」

「I’ll show you…」

I manifested 7 Flame Blades that shone blue and shot them towards Astrue. The Flame Blades destroyed Astrue’s magic barrier in a single blow.

「W-Wait!」

「Nn, nope.」

Confused, Astrue barely managed to defend the Flame Blades with her magic and whip, and reconstructed her barrier.

Hmm, seems like I need to increase the number of hits a little bit more…

Oh, right. My tails are also wrapped in flames. And since I have 8 flaming tails, it would be a loss to not use them.

I readied myself and launched a barrage of attacks again, but this time I used twin swords in both hands and my tails for a total of 17 consecutive attacks. Unable to defend herself in time, Astrue’s limbs were burned and seemed to have received a fair amount of damage.

In addition, she was unable to hide her restlessness at all.

「Why is there a monster like you in this place!」

「Why? …Because “Aun” is here.」

「That doesn’t make sense!」

Hmm, her reaction is different from what I expected. As soon as Zoa heard Aun’s name, he spoke Aun’s family name. As if he already knew about Aun…

Astrue, however, reacted as if she had never heard Aun’s name.

「Come to think of it… is the demon named Zoa here?」

「Z-Zoa!? There’s no way he’s here!」

「I see… That’s fine.」

「Wait a minute. Are you guys connected to the Onimeshu?」

「Onimeshu? What is that?」

「It’s fine if you don’t know.」

I would have liked to learn more details, but I got the feeling that Astrue wasn’t going to talk anymore. Moreover, the burns on her hands and feet had disappeared during the conversation. Even when her arm is cut, she can reattach it instantly. So it’s only natural that she can heal a few burns quickly.

Hmm, in that case… Let’s give the composite magic a try.

When switched to melee attacks again, Astrue switched to magic attacks while keeping her distance. As I expected, she seems to have realized that close combat is a disadvantage for her.

Judging from the battle pattern so far, Astrue never overdoes it. When she is at a disadvantage, she uses magic barrier, and flight to increase the distance and prioritizes on recovery. I think the reason she doesn’t attack from the sky is either because she doesn’t have a potent attack she can use from that distance or it’s just a matter of her remaining mana.

But that’s an advantage for me. Besides, I haven’t shown my [Sky Dance] and [Construction Inhibition] skills so far. Let’s first try to create an opening with these two skills and magic.

While repelling the wind cutters fired by Astrue with my Flame Blades, I obstructed her field of vision with an explosive fire-attribute magic called Flame Bomb. Then, I quickly circled to her back and destroyed her magic barrier and cut off both her arms with 7 Flame Blades.

And just as I expected, Astrue flapped her wings and retreated into the sky while attempting to reconstruct her magic barrier.

From her facial expression, restlessness, anger, anxiety and such oozing out, I could tell what Astrue was thinking about.

“Who the hell is she?”, “A demon like me couldn’t possibly lose to a mere beastman”, “I have to erase her somehow”, “I need to regenerate my hands first”.

If she had chosen to escape at this moment, I wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it. But it seems that her pride as a demon didn’t allow it.

I used [Flash] to block her vision again and used [Sky Dance] to jump up into the sky. In a flowing motion, I put one hand on Astrue’s magic barrier and converted the barrier’s attribute to Light with [Construction Inhibition].

In which case, the barrier protecting Astrue transformed into a cage that confines her.

「What the hell is this!! What’s going on!?」

Following that, I thrust my right hand into the barrier and activated the fire attribute magics, Flame Bomb and Fire Storm, as well as the light attribute magic Lightning Impact.

「Gyaaaaaaa!! It’s hot, hoooooooot!!!」

「Don’t worry. I’ll kill you beautifully.」

Within the light sphere that floated in midair, numerous flashes and explosions swirled in addition to the blazing blue flames.

I haven’t really tried this move before, but it seems to be a success.

After landing on the ground, I activated my maximum output Flame Lance towards the bright shining sphere.

A composite magic of fire and light attribute that I came up with when I saw Aun’s [Roaring Lightning King] and Drake’s dual-attribute barrier.

This is my first successful skill, so let’s give it a cute name.

「Blue Fireworks].」

When the Flame Lance collided with the sphere of blue flame entrapping Astrue, the colossal amount of energy that was entrapped within the barrier and had nowhere to go erupted along with an explosive sound that shook the ground. A large blue flower could be seen blooming under the pitch black night sky.