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Chapter 44: The Tenth Apostle

The team battle had ripened without us realizing it.

Boom!

We had just defeated the seventh apostle.

Seron and I led the charge while Card and Grantoni supported us from the rear.

Thanks to our combined efforts, we managed to bring down the seventh apostle through sheer determination.

“Haah… haah…”

Beside me, Seron panted heavily.

The battle against the apostles had left Seron in a battered state.

She would have retired long ago if Grantoni hadn't used necromancy to mend her wounds.

Considering Seron’s usual capabilities, she had performed far better than expected.

Her skills were at the upper-middle level.

For someone like her to fight through to the seventh apostle was purely a testament to her indomitable will.

Even I, with my superior stamina, was on the verge of exhaustion.

Seron, naturally, was in an even worse state.

Tick.

At that moment, the sound of time ticking reached us.

The clock on the ceiling now read 25 minutes.

It had taken us 25 minutes to defeat the seventh apostle.

The Iris team had defeated the apostles in just 31 minutes and 21 seconds.

In other words, if we didn’t defeat the remaining three apostles within six minutes, first place would slip from our grasp.

“Seron, can you hold on?”

“Huff… huff… who do you think you’re calling weak?”

Seron gripped her dual axes tightly, her heavy breathing punctuating her resolve.

She was still ready to fight.

“Six minutes left to first place.”

Seron bit her lip firmly.

Despite struggling fiercely to claim the top spot, the gap with the Iris team remained dauntingly large.

It had taken us 25 minutes to bring down the seventh apostle.

The next apostle would only be stronger, and the one after that even stronger.

The final apostle had taken even the Iris team a full 10 minutes to defeat.

Yet, despite this, Seron refused to loosen her grip on her axes.

“Hmph, more than enough!”

Instead, she scoffed and radiated determination.

Seeing this, I couldn’t help but smirk.

“Good, that’s the spirit.”

This is why we had pushed ourselves to defeat the apostles as quickly as possible.

Now, it was time to reap the rewards of those efforts.

“It’s enough.”

Boom!

As soon as I finished speaking, a massive coffin crashed down from the sky.

Creak—

The coffin’s lid opened, revealing an apostle in formal attire, its hands clasped over its chest.

The apostle’s face was obscured, but its lone, elongated fangs gleamed menacingly.

The eighth apostle.

A vampire.

The dark, oppressive aura emanating from the apostle swept roughly over Seron and me, making our skin crawl.

The murderous intent was so palpable it raised every hair on my body.

But to me, there was no more welcome hostility than this.

All our prior battles had led to this moment.

The vampire began to spread its wings, its mouth opening wide.

If it took to the skies, we’d be in serious trouble.

“Sharin.”

So—

“Yes, finally.”

We had prepared for this.

Sharin’s staff twirled lightly at her fingertips.

The mana she had been conserving all this time began to visibly surge.

“Wow…”

Even Card, a fellow mage, gasped in astonishment.

The sheer output of magic pouring out of Sharin was absurd.

“Let’s finish this… cleanly.”

The surroundings began to be dyed white.

The earrings dangling from Sharin’s ears shook wildly under the influence of her magic.

And then—

“I’ll erase you.”

Sharin’s staff swung downward.

―――――――!

All sound in the area was swallowed up.

A blinding light pierced through the vampire as it was about to take flight.

The light was so intense that even those watching from the outside were forced to close their eyes.

BOOM!

A delayed shockwave swept through the space, shaking everything violently.

I barely managed to grab Seron by the nape and steady her as she was about to be flung away.

What remained was a field dyed pure white.

The vampire, of course, was gone—its coffin, too, reduced to nothing.

Once again, I was reminded of how monstrous Sharin Sazaris’s magic truly was, the magic of a top-ranked mage.

If I had faced that head-on, I would have been sent straight to the afterlife without exception.

“Phew.”

Sharin blew lightly on the end of her staff.

The eighth apostle, the vampire.

Regrettably, it had been obliterated moments after its appearance.

Including its arrival time, the vampire had taken only 50 seconds to defeat.

“If you could do that, why didn’t you just do it from the start!?”

Seron, who had been gaping, shouted indignantly.

“That wouldn’t have gotten us first place.”

I helped Seron to her feet and turned to Sharin.

The earlier attack had greatly depleted Sharin’s mana.

Even for someone like Sharin, wiping out an apostle in one strike required immense power.

And then—

Sizzle—

Sharin’s staff began to disintegrate into dust.

She brushed off the remains wistfully and pulled a new staff from her waist.

Modern staffs couldn’t handle the immense output of Sharin’s full power.

As a result, Sharin was always limited in how much of her true strength she could wield.

‘To a mage, a staff is like a launchpad.’

Even with the best bullets, you can’t fire them without a gun.

Likewise, a mage can’t unleash magic without a staff, and their ability to do so is heavily restricted.

Sharin had the best bullets in the world.

But modern staffs were incapable of fully unleashing her potential.

‘And those staffs are supposed to be the best of the best.’

Yet even they couldn’t withstand Sharin’s magical output and kept breaking.

Because of this, Sharin’s most powerful spells came with a clear limit: the consumption of staffs.

While she could cast magic without consuming a staff,

that wouldn’t allow us to defeat the remaining apostles within the time limit.

“Grantoni.”

This is why I had assembled this party.

At my call, Grantoni’s skeletal eyes glinted ominously.

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“Grantoni.”

That’s why I orchestrated this plan.

With my call, Grantoni’s skull flickered with a glint of sinister light.

“It’s your turn.”

The sky opened up.

From the rift in the heavens emerged an apostle, its translucent fabric billowing in the air.

Beneath the flowing fabric, dozens of long arms brandished merciless weapons.

Amid the folds, multiple eyes gleamed.

The Ninth Apostle.

The Grim Warden of the Afterlife.

It had appeared to claim the lives of the living.

The Grim Warden exists in both the physical world and the underworld.

This grants it immunity to physical attacks and resistance to magical ones.

To defeat such a being, the key lies with someone learned in divine studies.

Only the blessings of the gods can harm the Grim Warden.

Team Iris managed to defeat the Grim Warden through the blessings of a divine scholar.

Even then, it took considerable time to bring it down.

But what about us?

“Ah...”

Seron belatedly realized why I had recruited Grantoni.

As she understood, it was precisely for this moment.

A small sanctuary.

The spirit conjurer, Grantoni.

For someone who could traverse the veil between realms,

an apostle caught halfway between the physical world and the shadow realm was the easiest prey imaginable.

Clack! Clack!

Grantoni’s teeth clattered together, revealing his exhilaration.

At the same time, a gray world rapidly spread outward from beneath his feet.

Everything around began to lose its vitality and light.

The gray realm expanded further, swallowing even the Grim Warden that had manifested.

The shadow realm.

Grantoni had dragged the Grim Warden into his own backyard.

With a clap of his hands,

Clang! Clang! Clang!

dozens of chains emerged from the void, ensnaring the Grim Warden.

Though immune to physical attacks,

the Grim Warden couldn’t escape and was firmly bound.

Boom! Crash!

The Grim Warden, caught off guard by its entrapment, displayed visible confusion.

But there was no time for it to panic.

Wooooong!

The chains began to emit a radiant blue light.

The Grim Warden’s translucent form began to materialize.

“Hehehehe...”

Grantoni cackled, his teeth clicking together.

“This is my domain.”

Within the shadow realm,

Grantoni held far greater authority than the Grim Warden.

The Grim Warden belatedly thrashed in resistance,

but the chains only tightened, constricting its very essence.

There was no escaping the chains.

They had already wrapped around the Grim Warden’s soul itself.

Grantoni flicked his fingers.

“Out.”

Shatter!

Gray fragments broke off from the Grim Warden’s body.

It was forcibly expelled from the shadow realm.

As a result, the Grim Warden was fully materialized in the physical world.

And waiting for the fully materialized Grim Warden was

Sharin’s magic.

Once more, a burst of white light erupted into the sky.

In its spectral form, the Grim Warden boasted high magical resistance.

But now, with its spectral state undone,

its magic resistance had reverted to ordinary levels.

Boom! Boom! Boom!

Sharin unleashed a barrage of devastating spells, sacrificing her top-tier staff in the process.

The magic engulfed the Grim Warden, shattering it into fragments.

But this time, it didn’t stop at just one strike.

Sharin grabbed another staff and unleashed successive blasts.

Crack! Shatter!

Through the remnants of the broken fabric, a small childlike figure was caught in the blinding light and disintegrated.

The Grim Warden’s second life, its hidden reserve, was extinguished.

“Phew...”

Sharin exhaled lightly, scattering the powdered remains of her staff in the air.

Beads of sweat adorned her face.

Using the maximum firepower from a top-tier staff three times in succession was exhausting, even for Sharin.

“T-Tenth already...”

Seron, who had been dazed, hurriedly checked the time.

The time taken to defeat the Grim Warden: 2 minutes.

The clock now read 28 minutes and 10 seconds.

The remaining time: 3 minutes and 2 seconds.

If the Tenth Apostle wasn’t defeated in this time, first place would be out of reach.

“No problem! Sharin’s magic will take care of it!”

“No, Sharin’s magic alone won’t be enough this time.”

Seron’s confident expression faltered.

Unfortunately, I couldn’t agree with her.

Crack!

The ground trembled and split apart.

Carda used shadow magic to lift us safely above the fissures.

From between the cracks emerged a figure.

A long, slender body topped not with a head but with countless feathers.

Its small, glowing body shone with fluorescent light.

Even with Iris, the most formidable in martial combat, bolstered by divine blessings,

it had taken 10 minutes to defeat this apostle.

The Tenth Apostle.

The Thunderbird.

It had arrived.

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