971: Evil Energy and Titan-Type

We launched an all-out attack on the titan-type after he fell flat on his face.

「Thor Hammer!」

『Kanna Kamui!』

「Awoooo!」

My multiple Kanna Kamuis rained down on the titan’s head along with Fran and Urushi’s spells. The top half of the titan’s head, which was the size of a small apartment complex, completely shattered. Some mysterious black substance gushed out instead of gray matter.

Then, a barrage of countless fireballs poured down on the titan. We were of course not the only ones on the job.

In addition to Izario’s flames, there were rock spears that seemed to be from Shikimi. These were followed up by arrows and magic coming from the soldiers and adventurers.

Hundreds of our attacks landed on the titan’s upper body, but this wasn’t the end.

The old soldiers of the Hagane gathered in several places, and each group radiated an enormous amount of mana. They were preparing ritual magic, in which several people cooperated to cast a single spell.

After their long chant of over a minute, they unleashed several huge fireballs. Perhaps this was intended to compete with Izario.

The dozen or so fireballs flew in a large arc before landing on the titan. Rather than exploding, this spell seemed to incinerate the target with a inextinguishable magical inferno.

The upper half of the titan’s body was almost completely engulfed in the flames. Even so, this was not enough to defeat him. He’s still healthy despite being dealt such a big blow.

『Fran! Let’s keep him pinned!』

「Nn! Urushi, go for the right arm!」

「Woof!」

As she held me above her shoulder, Fran gave Urushi a command. Urushi immediately dived down from the sky and dashed by the titan’s arm, close enough to touch it.

Fran swung me right as we passed, cutting a deep gash into the titan’s right wrist. We didn’t manage to sever it, but we succeeded in interrupting his actions.

The titan was trying to lift himself up, but losing the use of his right arm caused him to fall right back down. His huge body slammed against the ground once more, starting from his right shoulder.

「Nice one, little lady!」

「Nn!」

The plan was to keep on chipping away at him, even if each blow wasn’t enough to kill him.

The titan-type released a burst of mana from his entire body in an attempt to blow away everything in the vicinity. Unfortunately for him, that didn’t work on the second division.

Fran, Izario, and the soldiers from Hagane put up multiple barriers to defend against the mana burst.

In the end, we managed to defeat the titan-type without losing a single soldier. The final blow was an all-out spell from both Izario and me.

With his head incinerated and a gaping hole in his chest, the titan’s regenerative powers could no longer keep up. His huge body slowly crumbled away.

Following the titan’s defeat, the second division continued its way to the collapsed town to check on any remaining antidemons.

However, our job was not to rescue survivors. Our unit’s sole mission was defeating the titan-types. Rescue, rebuilding, and food distribution were to be done by the support unit following behind us.

「Hmm, we might have to to consider abandoning this town.」

「Really?」

「It’ll take too long to rebuild. The area is still a valuable safe zone, but it’s too hard to use for a town right now. The inhabitants seem to have been wiped out either way.」

「……Nn.」

The town was crawling with antidemons, and there was no sign of the original inhabitants.

Izario and the others speculated that the town’s inhabitants had been rendered immobile by the titan’s mana draining ability. Then that’s when the antidemons struck.

The antidemons supposedly remained in town to destroy the safe zone…… but I couldn’t figure out why they needed so many when the town was completely occupied.

Was there something in town attracting the antidemons? Maybe the survivors were hiding somewhere, and the antidemons were lured by their mana?

Izario and Shikimi discussed this possibility and decided to send out scouts to search for anything unusual. Our main target was the area where the titan-type had been rampaging.

We also tried searching the town for any signs of life while riding on Urushi’s back. That’s when Fran and Urushi both noticed something at the same time.

After a moment’s delay, I realized it too.

（Master. This.）

『Yeah. It’s evil energy.』

We sensed a dense cloud of evil energy from a portion of the earth.

The ground was caved in there after being crushed by the titan. A mountain of debris had collapsed into the large hole, completely covering it up.

I considered the possibility of a powerful antidemon hidden inside that hole, but the aura of evil energy wasn’t moving.

『Urushi, stay here. Keep an eye out for antidemons.』

「Woof!」

『We take care of the debris.』

「Nn!」

After carefully stowing away the debris, we headed for the bottom of the hole. Fran pointed to an opening in the rubble at our feet about halfway down.

「Master, over there.」

『There’s some kind of purple light coming out from underneath!』

It closely resembled the glow of the evil crystals we saw a while back. Perhaps the Dragon King had some scheme in this town as well. Maybe there’s still some evil crystals under here too.

Normally, the evil crystals should have been shattered by the titan’s trampling. However, maybe some of them miraculously avoided destruction due to gaps in the rubble.

Anyways, we have to find out if these really are evil crystals or not.

We continued our excavation, reaching the bottom of the hole without finding any crystals. The underground room must have originally been about 20 meters below the ground.

But we did find something unusual emitting the evil energy. It came from a huge magic circle drawn on the floor, shining with a dark purple light and radiating a dense aura to the surroundings. No wait, after removing more debris to reveal the entire magic circle, we managed to find an evil crystal too.

The small evil crystal sat at the center of the magic circle. Based on the flow of mana, this crystal must be supplying power to the circle. Moreover, the circle seemed to do more than just pollute the air with evil energy.

I felt a weird reaction coming from my Golden Formula skill. This magic circle seemed to have some kind of effect on the antidemons. Considering the titan’s behavior, this must be what was attracting the horde.

『I’ll store the evil crystal away for now.』

（And break the magic circle.）

『Yeah.』

However, I noticed something a little concerning.

『There were tons of evil crystals in Sendia’s underground room, right?』

And yet there’s only a small one here. Was it like this from the beginning? Or did someone already retrieve the crystals not used to power the circle?

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