I Killed the Player of the Academy-Chapter 248 ༺ The Three Wells (1)༻

→ The Three Wells (1)←

The 1.2-kilometer-tall giant was able to threaten the army just by reaching out.

“Create barriers! Stop its fist!”

Mages immediately created barriers to stop the incoming fist. Working together, they were able to make dozens of layers of high-grade barrier spells, which could individually stop most attacks while only sustaining a single crack.

However, Wickerman’s punch was like no other. 𝗳𝚛𝗲𝕖𝚠𝚎𝚋𝗻𝗼𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝚘𝐦

– Kaduk!

The barrier screamed like a pane of glass before a hammer and shattered to pieces. Unhinged, the punch continued through the barriers and came striking down towards the ground.

“U, UAAAAAHKK…!”

Everyone screamed as the fist came closer and closer, and at last reached the ground.

– Kuung!

The soldiers that were right below the fist saw no way out and thought they had been flattened to death.

“Huh?”

“I, I’m… alive?”

Their bodies were still fine and there was not a single injury in sight. Turning their eyes around in confusion, they sought the answer, which came from the girl wearing black nun clothes.

“S, Sister Hua Ran?”

She stopped the heavy fist, and was carrying it all by herself with nothing but her bare body.

“Heavy.”

It was definitely more threatening than just ‘heavy’. The gigantic Wickerman reaching 1.2 kilometers in height was dozens of times bigger than a normal Wickerman, and yet Hua Ran was withstanding that with her sheer strength.

Heavenly Yaksha Hua Ran.

She was proving why she was at the pinnacle of the innumerable superhumans that were in the expedition. Soon, she proved herself even more by slowly pushing the fist up.

– …!

However, the opponent was a 1.2-kilometer-tall giant. It added its own bodyweight into the fist, trying to push her down into the ground.

“Kuht…!”

Even Hua Ran was being pushed back a little by little.

But that was when someone darted forward while covered in radiant light.

“In the name of the lord…!”

While speaking of the name of the false god, the Saintess was swinging the weapon of a different god.

The Club of Dagda in her hand violently struck the Wickerman’s arm.

The Wickerman faltered a little but its body was rooted deeply into the ground. One arm straying away for a moment served no threat.

“I, it’s coming again!”

Seeing the arm being pulled back for another punch, the soldiers couldn’t help but lament in despair. Although their numbers were many, it was meaningless at the face of such a giant.

“They’re looking down on our firepower too much. Mages, set your coordinates.”

It was then. The slave mages at the rear and the countless mages allocated across the army came together.

They shot fireballs, the bane of trees, straight at the enormous target.

– Kwagagang!

Yggdrasil Wickerman was struck from left and right by the onslaught of spells.

“A giant that’s merely big is nothing but food for small elite knights. Knight squads, get ready to climb up.”

Korin quickly led the knights onto the roots and dashed up the body of the Wickerman.

– Grrrh…!

– Gyaaah…!

There were numerous Shadow Demons emerging from the body of Yggdrasil Wickerman, but Korin sneered at the sight.

“Don’t be afraid,” he reassured the knights. “In a small area where the Shadow Demons can’t make use of their numbers advantage, they are nothing to be afraid of. Alicia, Hua Ran. We’re going ahead.”

Hua Ran responded by over-feeding aura into the chains suppressing her body.

Her chains rapidly grew in size and weight. They became whips that struck down at the demons emerging from the Wickerman’s body.

Hundreds of them lost their footing and immediately fell to their deaths. In the meantime, Hua Ran and the knights pounced at the remaining Shadow Demons.

“Kill them all!”

“We’ve hunted enough demonic beasts already!”

Shadow Demons.

They were the ancestors of demonic beasts and spirits – an ancient monster and the origin of demons.

However, each of them individually were no match to the higher-grade demonic beasts and spirits. Their small bodies that were barely able to materialize were too weak and light to have a chance against demon-hunting specialists.

“We broke through!”

“Aim for the target!”

“Find the weak spot of the Wickerman!”

Shadow Demons and the Wickerman.

Although it would be a lie to say this wasn’t a threat at all—

“The size is impressive, but it’s an old-fashioned technique reeking of mold. It’s not much compared to the new-type super robot on our side.

Wickerman.

Fundamentally, it was a gigantic golem made by merging a tree with a sacrifice. Just by removing the sacrifice which served as the core, it was possible to neutralize a Wickerman.

“Time to get going.”

Korin activated his Sun, Claiomh Solais. Although divine energy would work on the tree giant, it was more to deal with the next moves of the opponent.

– GUWWWOOOOOH…!

In the next instant, the entire body of the Wickerman was starting to be covered in flames. On the brink of its defeat, it was burning the sacrifice at a quicker pace to turn into a flaming giant.

“Be caref…!”

However, it served to be a futile attempt. The moment the flames were about to soar into the skies, it started being absorbed somewhere.

<Sun Manifestation – Claiomh Solais>

Above the Wickerman, a large Sun had appeared, displaying its majestic appearance while absorbing the flames.

“Ohh…”

“T, the Sun.”

“Sir Korin…”

The soldiers and the knights turned their eyes of awe to the person behind this unimaginable feat. The person in question commanded the Sun to fall towards the Wickerman.

“You might be able to offset some of it, but can you, a wooden puppet, survive this?”

Quickly the Sun came pressing down from above the Wickerman.

– Flick!

The Wickerman’s body started the burn immediately upon contact with the Sun. Despite being made from the branches of the World Tree, which could absorb divine energy, that alone wasn’t enough to fend off the Sun.

In fact, Kranel and Yuel’s Union Wicker Warrior might have been able to react with more agility, because they had the power to cool itself down, and heat-protection on its core.

– Tadak!

The 1.2-kilometer-tall giant was slowly breaking apart, but Korin didn’t let his guard down because the real threat was still looming.

[Yggdrasil Wickerman – Ejecting the Core]

Right before the head of the Wickerman was about to completely burn down from the Sun, something popped out of its chest where the sacrifice would usually go into.

– Huh? Something came out…

– What’s that light?

– S, shoot it down!

The mages and archers each imbued mana into their attacks and targeted at the core.

Thousands of them were shooting arrows and spells of magic. All the consumables and magic items that were prepared for this war were being used unsparingly.

However, the core showed off a miraculous path of flight as it dodged every single attack coming its way. Despite giving off light on the black canvas of darkness, none of the attacks were able to land on it.

“What… is with that mobility…”

One of the knights in the army and a graduate of the academy found the movement to be very similar to what he remembered.

Right – it resembled the infamous shooting practice targets, the elemental bodies that would mock the shooter every time they missed.

It was showing a miraculous pathway in the air that seemed to disregard all laws of physics… in fact, it seemed even more liberated than an elemental body…

“Wait…”

The flying core, the source that allowed that gigantic Yggdrasil Wickerman to move in the first place…

– Kung!

It was incomparable to the likes of elemental bodies, a mere object that earned the ability to move after a contract with low-grade elemental spirits.

This was the materialized form of a pure elemental. A feat of miracle, only made possible through the elemental willingly listening to a request and not through the means of a contract.

Only the representatives of nature, druids, were able to materialize elementals just by request.

“Damn it. What elemental is it? It seems to be a wind-type…”

“Anti-elemental formation. Get ready.”

They readied themselves and got in ranks. Although they didn’t know what elemental it was, it would be meaningless against an army this big, or so they thought.

“I agree that it is fast, but what insolence, trying to fight against a squad of knights and mages all by itself.”

Despite being with the larger army, Yuel the Druid couldn’t help but feel ominous, as her body shivered from uneasiness.

Until now, she had encountered countless elementals, all the way from low-grade elementals to powerful high-grade elementals.

Some of them looked like midgets with wings; a few looked like beasts, and others simply took on their pure elemental form.

However, none of them were glowing this bright, and none of them ever looked so-distinctly human before.

“Dumnorix…”

A druid, who didn’t enjoy concerning themselves in the matters of human society, was siding with Tates Valtazar.

He wasn’t just a normal sage of the forest either, and was one of the greatest sages of all time among druids.

Considering all that…

“Ah…”

Recalling the existence that was passed down among the legends of druids, Yuel immediately yelled out loud.

“Everyone be careful! That’s the Elemental King—!”

In an instant, a tempest gushed past the soldiers.

“Huh?”

“Hnn?”

The breeze felt normal albeit being on the slightly stronger side. The knights and mages tilted their heads from the strange feeling it left behind, before realizing that their heads were continuing to tilt past a natural threshold.

– Drop…

It was a shocking and surreal sight.

Humans were crumbling down in fragments of flesh.

“W, what?!”

“What the…!”

Hundreds of them lost their lives with just one attack. With the Sun radiantly displaying the sight from above, the horror was all the more clearer for everyone to see.

[Yggdrasil Wickerman – Elemental King of Wind]

Elemental King.

Normal elementalists couldn’t even dream of encountering them, and only the greatest sages among druids were able to come across those legendary existences.

That Elemental King was here, and had decided to bury every human it can see following the request of its long-time friend.

“Old King.”

A knight stopped him in his path. Standing before the Elemental King who had just sliced apart hundreds of soldiers and superhumans was a spearman with a silver arm.

“You can punch people until they’re almost dead, but you can’t kill them like that.”

The Elemental King did not bother waiting for the knight to finish his words. Controlling the surrounding environment and syncing it with his will, the king created tens of lethal blades.

– Karuruk…!

The blades of wind were blocked by the Silver Arm of the God King, Airgetlam. Korin Lork blocked all the lethal attacks using his Silver Arm and closed the distance in a flash to push his spear forward.

– Kwaah!

A wall of compressed wind stopped the spearhead in its tracks. As if there was an invisible wall, the spear could not move a single inch forward.

<Two-faced Ominous Snake>

Instead of ending the failed spear attack there and then, he twisted it ever so slightly to pierce up from below. The Elemental King couldn’t see through the profound mysteries of that attack and allowed a scratch to his thigh before he could even react.

“…?”

Feeling threatened, the Elemental King pushed the entire dimension away from him. Due to the burst of wind from the front, Korin was pushed back but nonchalantly gazed at the king, as he carried the Silver Spear on his shoulders.

‘It feels like a spiritual body, but the compressed wind surrounding it lets it actively defend itself. Like a constantly activated barrier on all fronts.’

While fighting the enemy hands-on, Korin was trying his best to see through the opponent.

“I wanted to fight against the Elemental King of Fire, but… this isn’t bad either.”

Rooting his legs into the ground, he stared at the Elemental King of Wind that was standing at the center of an enormous tempest.

One of his spear techniques included one that allowed him to absorb the incoming energy of the opponent and reverse it upon the attacker.

As such, when a tornado of wind blades came flying his way, he simply drew a circle with the spear despite the wind threatening to cut his body down into pieces.

<Eight Trigrams: Yin and Yang>

He absorbed the rampaging wind with the spear. By sending off a wave of aura, he altered the incoming attack ever so slightly.

Using the same principle as getting rid of a tornado by setting off a bomb at the eye of the tornado, Korin parried the attack with the tiniest amount of energy required.

“???”

Seeing that mysterious display of martial arts, the Elemental King of Wind gave a confused frown. His compressed wind had disintegrated just from a few swings of a spearman, and he was rightfully confused.

“Being so lofty and esteemed, you don’t come out to the material world so often, do you? A higher-grade elemental might have been more annoying because of its experience.”

“…”

The Elemental King sensed that the human was mocking him right now. Right when he was about to pour his fury on the pitiful mortal.

“Sorry, but we’re a ‘group’. We’re not interested in a fair one-on-one battle.”

Flinch!

The Elemental King felt goosebumps.

It was a feeling that he could feel only because he manifested into a material body to come to this world. Before the king could make sense of the feeling it had just felt, the attack was already looming before him.

Arden, Alicia-style Thousand Swords—

Eyes that could see through even the cracks of the dimension.

With those eyes, she saw the true body of the materialized Elemental King. Her sword was flying forward at what should normally be left unseen.

“We wouldn’t have bothered coming here in such a large group if we were going to let a single Elemental King hold us back.”

— Infinity. Exceeding the Domain

The core that should be unexposed was revealed, and the Elemental King was expelled from the real world after losing its core.

****

After defeating the Yggdrasil Wickerman and the Elemental King, we advanced for two more days before finally arriving at a well.

There were two Elemental Kings that could appear in the World Tree setting, and the Elemental King of Wind was the only enemy we saw before arriving at the well.

– It’s there!

– Look around!

The soldiers carefully patrolled the area around the well. Although they were feeling thirsty, none of them dared to approach the well itself.

These past few days, they were made painfully aware that they couldn’t let their guards down for a moment in this world under the World Tree.

It was understandable considering they had encountered Shadow Demons, tribes under Valtazar as well as all sorts of monsters from mythologies.

Besides, there was also the command we had given them beforehand about never touching a well directly unless told to do so.

I looked around the surroundings of the well.

The roots of the World Tree were covering the center from all sides as well as the ceiling, and underneath was a golden pond that was giving off light by itself.

We knew what this radiant and beautiful pond of gold was called.

“Korin-ssi, this is…”

“Fuu… We got lucky.”

And paradoxically… It was also unlucky for us.