Published: March 21, 2026
This is Ria's first-person perspective.
It's not like I have no real combat experience.
Before becoming royal family, my household made a living by hunting, so although I don't have any skills and I'm not on par with adventurers, I thought I had seen my fair share of battles.
That's partly why I came to this labyrinth alone without any escort.
But this person was on a different level altogether.
What on earth...
I was stunned by the scene before me.
The wings were ripped off, one leg had been smashed into a bloody mess against the distant wall.
And most of all, the shark-like head that had been about to devour me was gone.
When I shifted my gaze a little, it was lying nearby with an expression as if it didn't understand what had happened to it.
I couldn't figure out what had occurred.
The last thing I remembered was Lord Akira holding two short black daggers in both hands, and before I knew it the wings and leg had fallen and the head had been severed.
My dynamic vision isn't bad.
And yet I hadn't seen any of it.
"Did Lord Akira defeat it?"
"Huh? Who else would have?"
I blurted out, and Lord Akira frowned, his clothes still pristine, not even stained with blood.
Indeed, there was no one else.
Lord Yoru hadn't moved because I was still on top.
I knew it had been Lord Akira who killed the demonic beast, but I had serious doubts that he could sever the head of a Poseidon that cancels magic with such short blades, and since the boss of the 80th floor had been taken down so effortlessly, my mind was in a muddle.
"Um, I believed it was impossible to cut off the head of a beast as big as a tree with such short daggers."
My head was in a mild panic over what 'normal' even meant now.
My common sense was being overturned so easily it frightened me a little.
"Master, I've gotten used to it so I can see him decently, but to normal people Master moves too fast to be seen."
Lord Yoru kindly explained.
This was supposed to be a monster called "Adrea's nightmare", but over these few hours the fear had significantly lessened.
Rumors turned out to be unreliable.
Surely it must have great power, but right now Lord Yoru was completely Lord Akira's loyal cat.
"Is that so?"
I nodded to Lord Akira, who tilted his head as if unaware.
As he climbed over Lord Yoru he explained.
"Yeah, you can't drop the head of a Poseidon that cancels magic with just short daggers, but magical power is different, right? Magic cancellation cancels magic, not magical power."
I still couldn't grasp it.
Or rather, I'd never heard of using only magical power.
Magical power is the fuel to cast magic.
Just as you burn wood to start a fire, without the wood that is magical power the fire that is magic won't ignite.
But wood alone doesn't make a fire.
Only when the two come together does magic, an attack, come into being.
"I thought that because magic contains magical power, canceling magic would simultaneously cancel the magical power too."
"That's reasonable, but magical power is magical power, not magic. Even if magic contains magical power, once it's become magic it's a different existence, so magic cancellation can only nullify magic... at least that's how I interpret it."
In other words, don't consider magic as something that merely contains magical power; consider it as something that exists through the use of magical power.
That made sense.
"I see. But how did you train yourself to directly manipulate magical power?"
Was it self-taught?
Direct manipulation of magical power was supposed to be a technique the first generation hero excelled at.
Many people had tried and none had succeeded.
No one had reached it.
"I didn't train. It just happened by chance when I was thrown into a ridiculous situation."
It was the first time I had met someone I'd call a genius.
I gaped in surprise.
"I-Is that so."
I muttered about how it was because Amelia told him to defeat the white bat without using shadow magic, or something like that.
Being able to do the same as the first generation hero by chance meant he possessed the same potential as that first generation hero.