The moment Argo sees those pointy ears, he brushes off Guilford when he tries to stop him, and calls out towards the cell.
She’s bound to the wall by those chains, and raises her head in response to his voice.
Her lifeless eyes don’t focus, and her scrawny cheeks show her pain.
“It’s not…”
Argo whispers as he sees this terrible scene, and he’s about to break open the cell with his sword, but notices something isn’t right.
“Argo, stand back!”
Guilford says in a hurry, and Argo reflexively jumps back, successfully evading the shadow that appears all of a sudden.
“W-what is that…”
Naoto’s surprised face is pointing to a magic circle on the wall of the dead-end, and the shadows emerging from it.
Shadows keep coming out from the magic circle, and eventually take the shape of people.
“Tch, a trap!?”
Guilford whispers, and we all hold our weapons towards the shadows.
They’re not very fast, and their attacks are simple, which makes it seem like they’ll be easy to deal with.
“W-what are these things?”
But once we actually start fighting them, we see that our weapons don’t work on them.
A slash supposedly cuts one in half, but it immediately puts itself back together and attacks.
“Magic!”
Yells Argo right away after judging that physical attacks won’t work.
Using magic in a tight space is dangerous because of friendly fire, but they’re high ranking adventurers, and have splendid coordination.
But it also doesn’t seem to work on the shadows, although it takes them more time to regenerate compared to when they were slashed.
“Dammit, what should we do?”
The shadows stopped appearing after the tenth one, but being completely on the defensive like this makes it clear we’re on the back foot.
And apparently they can sap away our stamina by touching us.
The shadows stop while regenerating, but we have to keep attacking them if that’s the case. At this rate, it’s only a matter of time before we become exhausted and run out of magic energy.
We can’t find a way to deal with them, so the word retreat pops into my head. Apparently those shadows have a limited range away from the magic circle.
That’s why those elves are there.
We have to save them, and it looks like the others agree.
“Can’t we do anything about that magic circle?”
Asks Guilford, but the mages, including Chris, shake their heads.
When I fired magic before, one of the spells pierced a shadow and reached the magic circle, but it disappeared just before it could land.
Maybe a stronger spell would work, but I have some reservations.
We’re underground. If I fire a spell strong enough to destroy the magic circle, we could end up buried alive.
I want to think that wouldn’t happen, but it might.
“Can I try something?”
Asks Naoto, who was quiet all this time.
“Try something?”
“Yes, this.”
After responding to Guilford, Naoto holds up his sword, whispers something, and it’s enveloped in a white light.
I’m pretty sure his job before hero is Master Swordsman. Is that a Master Swordsman skill?
I can feel the holy energy pulsating on that blade even without using Magic Energy Detection.
And its effect is big. Despite not being close anyway, the shadows back away from Naoto.
That confirms it to the rest of us too. That will work.
Also, since the holy attribute is effective, everyone else switches to anti-undead equipment.
We pour holy water on our swords, and change their attributes.
“Let’s go.”
Argo gives the signal, and we all form up around Naoto.
Mia would do great if she was here. That thought pops into my mind, but I shake it off. I need to focus on what’s in front of me.
The battle starts again, and the shadows are defeated like we never even had a problem with them in the first place.
Cutting a shadow in half still isn’t enough, so we need to cut them into pieces or they’ll slowly regenerate, but the flow of the battle is still on our side.
We’re all thinking the same, we can take down all the shadows like this.
But it’s actually only just beginning.
One, two, three shadows go down… But when there’s only one left, we hear a piercing scream.
It comes from the elf bound to the cell.
And the magic circle reacts to her voice by activating. A shadow comes out. Then another.
“H-hey, look.”
Someone whispers, but we’re more frightened by the elf that screamed than the new shadows.
There’s blood gushing from every visible orifice in her body, and she’s convulsing.
We can beat the shadows, but… Is she receiving that damage?
“Naoto, do you think you can destroy the magic circle with that?”
“…I won’t know until I try.”
Naoto doesn’t sound too confident, but we have to test it.
And his skill boosts his power more than my sword with the holy attribute.
“We’ll draw their attention, so try attacking the magic circle, Naoto.”
We quickly swap our weapons again, and Naoto moves out along with someone from Argo’s party, who has a shield. And then, we continue fighting, this time being careful not to damage the shadows.
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Thanks for the treat.