Published: March 21, 2026
Six wyverns’ fire-breaths struck, and the ship shuddered violently with a huge impact.
“Any damage?!”
I raised my face from where I’d been ducking and shouted to Noah, who was standing like a stone pillar.
Everyone else had crouched low and braced against the shock, but only Noah remained perfectly upright. What kind of core strength does she have? Even I had grabbed the bow to withstand that hit.
“It’s minor! This level is no problem!! But I can’t guarantee what happens next!!”
Noah shouted back after a quick scan of the area.
For people, Ria’s barrier protected them, and the parts of the ship that were hit were defended by the shells of turtle demonic beasts embedded in the ship’s materials. This time the blasts luckily hit where the shell covered, but next time it might not be so fortunate. The wyverns are intelligent, and we’re at a disadvantage in aerial combat. The hull may have thick armor, but there’s nothing we can do about the underside.
“Damn, if only they’d gather in one place...”
I grumbled as I watched the wyverns scatter. Maybe because there’s no lead wyvern to command the flock, the six surviving wyverns were each acting independently, which made their movements unpredictable and annoying. If their command structure were intact, we could wait and strike when they committed, but whether from hunger or berserk state, they won’t give up on us until that hunger is satisfied, even as their numbers are shot down. The dragon-shaped Yoru was trying to herd them into one spot like a sheepdog, but even with berserk behavior some intelligence remained—he couldn’t drive them that easily.
If they’d enter the consolidated formation like before and come into range of my shadow magic, I could swallow them whole, but up in the air the total shadow area is far smaller than in a forest. Even if I gathered shadows remotely, I couldn’t expand my shadow magic much. I clicked my tongue, displeased to see the weakness of shadow magic exposed in a place like this.
The six wyverns dodged Amelia’s arrows and Nanase’s wind magic and flew erratically while breathing fire toward the ship. I kept myself ready to activate shadow magic the moment any of them came within range.
“If we gather the enemies, we can do something!?”
From a place my voice shouldn’t have reached, Tsuda, protecting Ueno and Kazuki, yelled. Probably the hero or Kyousuke near him reached the same conclusion. Zeal and the others, who had traveled together this far, had solid formation and coordination. Together they matched roughly my own combat strength and experience.
“Oda-kun!!”
While I kept watching the wyverns and listening for the heroes’ movements, Tsuda suddenly called my name from a distance.
Even in the same class, Tsuda and I didn’t interact much. There was a certain kinship, two people who sat at the edge of the class, but I don’t remember ever talking with him.
“What is it!!”
I called back at the same volume. Tsuda ran toward me, ignoring his defensive position. Zeal, the other knight, stood in front of the non-combatants with a shield smaller than the one Tsuda carried. But since the enemy was in the sky, we needed another person covering the rear.
“You can be two shields in my place—no, you can do even better than me, right?”
Pressed by the straightforward look in his eyes, I found myself nodding without thinking. If the range was about the same as a shield, I could easily handle it with shadow magic.
More than that, Tsuda’s eyes bothered me. The Tsuda I knew always watched Kyousuke and didn’t make much noise otherwise—he gave off the impression of a goody-two-shoes. But now something about him felt different. The heroes who always acted together would probably notice this change, but I didn’t.
“Then I’ll leave it to you. I’ll draw them in, so Asahina-kun and Sato-kun, you two take them all out. You can do it, right?”
The heroes and Kyousuke, addressed by the unusually assertive Tsuda, nodded timidly.