The Villainess That Was Once A VRMMO player - CH 43.1

The King’s Brother and the Witch (4)

“Y-you…!”

Camille-sama gasped in surprise at my sudden transformation.

That expression, along with his boyish smile, reminds me of a single person in my memory.

(…He’s the boy from that night.)

“We’ll talk later. First, I’m going to exterminate them.”

After fully recovering my HP/MP using my race abilities, I applied my full physical strengthening and leaped out onto the battlefield.

“[Fire Lance]”

[Bumooooooo.]

A [Fire Lance] shot out by discarding the chanting shoots one of the Mino-tans in the back.

“You [Rose Witch]. Where did you come from?”

There appeared to be a former survivor among the dark knights. Even though they were being attacked by Mino-tan, the Dark Knight who found me slashed at me.

“[Freeze]”

As expected in this situation, I couldn’t go easy on him, could I?

The knight’s armor instantly froze and crumbled away, and everyone’s eyes turned to me as if they had only just realized what had happened.

Could it be that the transformation was hidden by Mino-tan’s back? They were attacked by two other Mino-tans, after all.

“――[Lightning Slash]――”

Lightning Slash was a high-speed [Combat Skill] that slashed down the Mino-tan who was at a distance.

It was a triple-hit Combat Skill called Lightning Slash, which could travel up to 30 meters in a second while slicing through the side of a target.

It was unpopular in the VRMMO due to the complicated distance required to hit a target while using it to run across the battlefield, but once players got used to it, they could move around the battlefield at high speed, so it was commonly used by the experts.

[Bumoo…]

As Mino-tan collapsed, slashed almost to the point of severing its side, the knight with the bad attitude who had been fighting up until then looked at me with wide eyes.

“You, you are…”

“That one is an adventurer on our side! Only a few more of our enemies are left!”

“”…Haah””

At the right moment, Camille-sama shouted that I was on their side, and the escorting knights regained their energy and composure.

I felt that Mino-tan would be no problem since he could only rampage around, so I called out to the knight with the bad attitude who was standing nearby.

“Are you sure you handle the rest of it?”

“Ye, Yeah, of course. But what about you?”

“I will leave it to you then.”

With these words, I return my attention to the forest where the Mino-tan first appeared and where I had earlier spotted a figure.

“I’m going to eradicate the rats that are hiding.”

*

“What the…?”

Gallus, who was hiding in the forest with a few of his men, let out an involuntary gasp at the sudden appearance of the enemy.

Gallus did not have much faith in the Arceides soldiers. In order to be sure, he had ordered some of the Knights to capture Minotaurs in the dungeon and was planning to use drugs to temporarily strengthen them and make them kill Camille.

Two of the Minotaurs were defeated in quick succession by a woman in a crimson dress.

As he recalled, she was a half-elf adventurer called [Rose Witch], famous even in the capital for her violent temperament.

They had not seen her until now, but she must have been hiding in the carriage.

She was said to have appeared in Arceides’ territory and defeated a wyvern.

Gallus, who was gathering information for the prime minister, was aware of the existence of this adventurer because the Arceides had been harmed by her meddling in their affairs, but she was only an adventurer after all. He was under the impression that she posed no threat, but if she could defeat the Minotaur so easily, it might be true that she had defeated a wyvern on her own.

“You are a disgrace to the Kingdom of Caenista for hiring subhuman adventurers. Retreat for now.”

If that thing was hired by Camille, direct means could fail. The worst that could happen was that the [Sword Saint] appeared with a legitimate reason, but Gallus was not a fan of that man who was obsessed with strength and did not move for money.

He ordered his men to retreat, but the next time, he planned to take out the [Witch] and the others with a coordinated assassination attempt.

“Retreat! Hurry!”

“”Ha!””

He saw the Witch running toward them.

He wondered how she discovered him when he was so far away from them. Gallus muttered to himself as he and his men retreated. Elves and beastmen had higher senses than humans, and this was why he didn’t like subhumans.

“Guah!?”

“Naa…”

Suddenly, one of his men was pierced by an ice spear and rolled across the ground.

“Get in the forest!”

Was it the work of the Witch? It would be difficult for anyone other than a court mage to use an ice spear at this distance to kill a man with a single blow, unless the mage could use [magic] without chanting, and could increase the distance and power of the magic by adding more magic power.

But once in the forest, she will not be able to follow.

Gallus used a “Demon Repellent” that was rare even in the kingdom. These were made using powerful demons like dragons and wyverns, and were made by processing materials offered by the Sword Saint after he defeated them in the past. There were very few of them, and the one Gallus used was worth several large gold coins.

“…”

But there were still signs that she was following them.

Was that Witch using a demon repellent too? Or perhaps, like the Wicked Witch in the fairy tale, the demons were afraid of her?

“You, hold her back.”

“What? Uwaaah?”

Gallus slashed a subordinate running alongside him with his dagger, knocking him down, and then, perhaps lured by the smell of blood, a beast-like creature attacked his subordinate.

[Uwaaah――――]

Gallus was the only one with demon repellent. Hearing the screams of his men echoing behind him, Gallus ran further into the forest, hoping that the gathered demons would slow the Witch down.

After running as fast as he could through the forest for a few minutes, he slowed his steps to see if it was okay, when the forest atmosphere suddenly began to discharge an electrical charge.

“Why…, Guaaaaah!”

Lightning rained down over a wide area of the magical forest.

All the magic defense talismans he had stocked in large quantities for his work burned up at once, and yet the lightning continued to pierce Gallus’s body.

“…No…way…”

Even so, the talisman was useful to some extent, and Gallus was barely able to breathe under that much lightning.

Could it be that this was also Witch’s magic? Even the most powerful court mage would struggle to use such powerful magic. If this was truly the Witch’s work, her presence could be a threat to the kingdom.

I must return to the capital and report to the Prime Minister as soon as possible. As Gallus crawled forward with his battered body, a huge shadow suddenly appeared.

[“I am Pochi, the great dark dragon. I was in this area on the Lord’s orders. Are you the one who wears the scent of other unpleasant dragons? “]

“…A…ah…”

Demon repellent uses the scent of powerful demons to make weaker demons avoid them. Only strong demons could overcome it. Gallus suddenly remembered something a teacher had said at school decades ago.

[The only enemy of a dragon is another dragon. If they meet, there will always be a fight.]

Although it was not known due to the small number of dragons, if one were to use a dragon as a material to avoid demons, it would be synonymous with fighting against dragons.

“Ha…haha…”

[Then die, fools!]