Gambit Of The Living Weapon - Chapter 221 Melted hear

That’s not to say that Detra was a particularly cheerful person, nor that she didn’t already have a lot of reasons to dread her own day to day life, or even less that today had been even close to a good day for her with all the demons that kept trying to rip her apart, having to get stabbed by Daren without being allowed to fight back, or having to listen to Mia’s mockery.

But there was one thing, in particular, that could just completely destroy any last traits of her will to live.

“Behold!! This is the start of my story as the greatest hero who ever lived!!!”

Or rather, someone.

“UUUUUGHHHHH!!!!” she groaned with  a very powerful sense of self-defeat every time any word would come out from Joseph’s mouth.

[Mother!! Focus!!] Marcus tried to warn her.

“Whyyyy…?? Clearly there is no point in trying to save the human race… Just let Mia kill us all…” she replied trying to wonder if fighting by Joseph’s side was a less dreadful fate than falling in battle while staring at the boy’s behavior.

[MOTHER!!!] Marcus screamed inside her mind.

“Fine… Fine…” she whispered while pouting.

The woman finally dropped her crying act and began to cast her spell again.

“Do not fear, my princess!! I’ll stand here and guard you against any evil that would dare bear its fangs upon your lovely face!” Joseph commented while unleashing his electric whips on any demon or monster that dared to approach them.

Detra wanted to grab her staff and just stab the kid with each passing second they spent together, but she tried her best to contain her anger and focus on her mission.

“Grant me the power to freeze these lands…” she said while trying to start her chanting, “Grant me the strength to overcome my foe…”

[MOTHER!! MOVE!!]

“Eh…?”

Before she could continue, though, a fireball dropped from the sky and almost fell on her. The woman broke her chant and created an ice shield to block the attack that almost crushed her.

“What the hell was that!!??” she shouted, followed by glaring at the young mage “hey kid!! You’re supposed to be protecting me!!”

“I’m trying!! But this is not enemy fire!!” Joseph explained.

“Wha…?” Detra replied. She then paid closer attention to the field and noticed that Leona had summoned her fire ape again and was brawling with the water hydra.

To Detra’s surprise, this time her gorilla was actually putting up a fight. The hydra kept trying to blast the beast and stab its torso with one of its heads, but every time it tried, her flames would just make the water and ice evaporate.

“What the… What happened to the fire mage??” Detra pondered.

“A god…? You mean the new east goddess??” Detra wondered.

[Probably…]

“…” Detra began to lose herself in her thoughts. She was very curious about this new goddess of the east and really wished she could meet her.

[MOTHER!!!] Marcus yelled once again.

“Huh!? OH!!” her son’s voice alerted the woman to another incoming fireball that was about to fly towards her. It seemed like the battle between the giant elemental beasts was making Leona drop a couple of fireballs all over the field.

Detra used her ice magic once again to stop the fire, but a second one was coming right behind it. She was about to cast a platform to move out of the way but a group of red mages started to appear from behind her.

“Oh, great…” she mumbled while pondering what problem she should try to deal with first.

But before she could react, Joseph used his whips to explode the fireball before it could reach her.

“Sensei!! Did you see that!!? I just saved a goddess!!!” Joseph boasted.

“Former goddess, my pupil!” Xadi corrected him while still sitting on the kid’s head.

“Oh! Right! She’s not a goddess anymore… Sorry, miss Evlin’s maid!”

Detra just glared at the boy and the stuffed toy, “can I kill them…? Just a little?”

[NO!!!] her son stated, [and pay attention!!]

The red mages finally reached her while shouting “give us the living weapon!!!” and tried to aim at her with a barrage of elemental spells.

Detra aimed her staff at them to cast a freezing spell but Joseph was quicker and just zapped all of them with his whips.

The kid just started to grin while watching the red mages falling on the ground unconscious.

“Did you see her face, sensei!?? I just stole her kill!!!” the boy boasted again.

“I hate him… So much…” Detra whispered.

She did however finally realized that she could probably trust in him to keep her safe so she, at last, decided to focus on her task at hand.

“Grant me the power to freeze these lands…” she started her chant again, only this time, she was trying to focus all her magic energy remaining to make sure it would affect every single demon present on the field.

Marcus also tried to send as much blessed energy as he could to help his mother.

“Grant me the strength to overcome my foe…” Detra continued.

The magic kept gathering all around her, large pieces of frozen shards started to appear and float around her.

“Allow them to witness the power that it’s in my hands…”

With every word she said, her body started to feel heavier. The mere act of holding her staff was taking a lot out of her. Combining the power of her chanting magic that used every last drop of energy pilled inside of her, as well as the boost from Marcus and his blessed energy, she started to feel like her body was about to burn with power.

the icicles kept appearing around her. First, there were ten, then there were twenty, and the more she focused more kept appearing until a total of seventy-three ice shards were gathered by her side.

Joseph, who up until now was busy bathing in the glory of his own victories, finally stopped to look at the one he was protecting and started to shiver, “whoa…”

“Indeed…” Xadi commented. Being an ice mage himself, he knew exactly how difficult Detra’s current action was to perform, and as a man who held a lot of respect for magic, he couldn’t help but feel honored to be able to witness such an image.

“And let them quiver upon tasting the ultimate cold!!”

Detra finally finished her chant and every single one of her icicles began to fly around all over the field.

Joseph just kept looking as every single monster and demon present kept getting pierced by her attack one after another.

It looked like a rain of spears was falling down from the sky, except instead of reaching the ground, the spears were being guided to locate and kill any nearby creatures.

The carnage continued until more than half of Mia’s army of beasts had been completely decimated.

“There…” Detra whispered, “that should help… A little bit… Ugh…”

[Mother!!!]

Marcus returned to his human form and took hold of his mother as she was about to fall on the grass.

“Mother!! Mother, talk to me!!”

“Shut up… Let me sleep…” Detra replied while being unable to move.

“Ah! Thank the heavens you’re ok!!” the lad stated while giving the woman a deep hug.

Detra was about to make another snarky comment but she just accepted the hug with a shy smile on her face. She was still not used to Marcus showing affection towards her.

The moment didn’t last for long though, as she quickly reminded him that the job was not over yet.

“Come on… We still have a mission to complete! Now that most of the monsters are gone, we just have to deal with the red mages!”

“R- Right!! Joseph!!” Marcus called out the boy.

“Oh! W- What!?” Joseph responded.

“I’m going back to help out our troops! Can you take care of my mother until the recovery units arrive?”

“Su- Sure! No problem!!” Joseph replied while making a salute gesture as if Marcus was a general and he was a soldier.

“Thank you!” Marcus said, followed by turning his arms into blades, “I’m counting on you!!”

He then stormed off towards the group that was facing off with the red mages while the boy and Detra waited for help to arrive.

“Hey… Miss Evlin’s maid?”

Detra rolled her eyes, “I have a name, you know? I actually have three names!”

“S- Sorry… It’s just… I’m wondering if you can be my next teacher!!”

“… … … Excuse me…?” the lady replied.

“It’s just that… what you did back there was so cool!!! You just snipped all of them like if you had auto-target turned on!! It was awesome!!” the boy explained while waving his arms up and down.

Detra was about to dismiss his request but at the last moment, for some reason, while looking at this boy with wide eyes looking at her full of expectation and amazement, she was slightly reminded of her daughter, Marcy, and how she would always get impressed with her display of ice magic.

She still found it odd that this kid was being so cheerful with her considering her history.

“Do you… Do you not know who I am…? What I did?”

“Sure I do!” Joseph answered, “You were the goddess that raised Marcus and trained Ellie that miss Evlin brought home after you became friends! And now you’re helping us save the world with your ice magic!”

Detra just looked at the kid. She never considered looking at her history from that point of view.

“So…?” Joseph continued while begging with his hands, “will you please teach me ice magic??”

“Mmm…”

Detra felt that this would be a massive pain, but then she reminded her life was a living nightmare already so why change that now?

She then showed a weak smile and nodded to him, “sure… why not?”

Joseph was so happy that he pounced on the woman and gave her an even bigger hug than the one Marcus gave.

“THANK YOU!!!!” he shouted.

Detra then grabbed the kid by the throat and glared again, “do that again, and I’ll freeze your feet and put you at the bottom of a lake!”

Joseph then quickly released her, “yes ma’am!”