And so, we managed to escape our predicament and retreated all the way to Yggdrasil.
In silence, but at the fastest pace we could manage, we finally reached Selen's home atop one of the enormous trees and at last caught our breath.
The new Adler army, the masked Phantoms that had appeared at the Origin Temple—both were undeniably terrifying opponents that even high-level Hunters would struggle to deal with.
If even one thing had gone wrong, we would have had casualties on our side too. Truly, it had been like walking on thin ice.
"Well, well. This time I really thought it was all over."
I wiped my forehead with my arm. I hadn't actually broken a sweat, thanks to the comfortable conditions.
But even in those comfortable conditions, the situation had been clearly dire. If it hadn't been comfortable, I might not have been able to stay calm at all.
Just as I let out a sigh of relief, Klyus, who had come along with us, spoke up in a shrill voice.
"Hey, Weak Human! Why are you acting like everything's all wrapped up! Nothing's been resolved at all, you know!"
"The curse-breaking we came for hasn't been accomplished either. The intruders were unexpected, and we were certainly saved by their appearance, but—"
Selen chimed in, sounding somewhat troubled by Klyus's words.
Yeah, yeah. You're right. I didn't expect it either. And Klyus's words hit the mark. Nothing... has been resolved.
Lapis turned her usual cold gaze—I needn't even mention it's always like that—toward me and spoke.
"You led them in without even making contact with the scoundrels. Impressive, I suppose. Hmph... though you may have only made them more cautious."
"Lapis, Kuu has her own reasons for doing things... probably."
"Elisa, you're way too soft on the Weak Human! In the first place, of course she has reasons! Lapis is complaining because she assumed there was a plan behind that strategy!"
I don't have reasons. There wasn't even a strategy. It was all the result of pure chance.
If Adler and the others hadn't shown up, I might have died with no way out, so it's hard to say whether it was unlucky or not...
"D-don't worry! The Thousand Demons' Parade should take care of all the Phantoms!"
"...Weak Human, you really don't care friend from foe, do you? There's no way all the Phantoms will be wiped out—in a place with Mana Material dense enough to produce a temple-type Treasure Hall, Phantoms won't just run out!"
Well... that's not exactly what I meant, but they're definitely right about that.
Even if I temporarily wiped them all out, the Phantoms would continue to spawn in near-infinite numbers as long as the Treasure Hall remained intact. And since these ones weren't easy to kill, eliminating them all was next to impossible.
To save Luke, I had to find an opening somehow. I thought I'd found one this time, too...
I took a deep breath to calm myself, looked around at everyone who was exhausted, and spoke as cheerfully as I could manage.
"Come on, calm down. Regardless of how it happened, the Thousand Demons' Parade still reduced the number of Phantoms. This time, the timing was just a little off, that's all."
"This time? You mean like every time, don't you?"
Fair point. Now then, what to do...
Everyone looked none too well. Can't be helped—Lapis and the others had nearly been caught in a pincer attack.
But the fact that the Thousand Demons' Parade had come after us, splitting the enemy into two groups, wasn't necessarily a bad thing when you thought about it calmly.
An enemy of my enemy is not my friend. Our goal wasn't to exterminate the Thousand Demons' Parade or to conquer the Origin Temple. If I could manage the situation somehow, I should be able to buy enough time to break Luke's curse.
Now is the time to awaken, my brilliant stratagems!!
"Elisa, sorry to ask, but I'd like to check on the results of the fight between the Thousand Demons' Parade and the Phantoms. Could you scout it out again later?"
A massive number of Phantoms had appeared. Even if the Mana Material accumulation rate was fast, it should take at least a little time before the next batch manifested.
From what I'd seen just before we escaped, the Adler army had appeared to be putting up a pretty good fight against the Phantom army. If we'd visited the Treasure Hall a bit sooner this time, we could have broken Luke's curse in time—there was a decent chance a window would open up... probably.
Watching me cross my arms and desperately wrack my nonexistent brain while putting on a hard-boiled grin, Elisa gave a big, firm nod.
--- Deepest section of the Sacred Tree Passage. Without warning, a blade of black metal burst into the air, slashing wide through the void.
From the spatial rift that formed, Yuden's head crawled out. He had nothing from the chest down, and on his back he carried the half-dead Adler and Quint.
Finally, Uno stumbled out of the rift, barely alive, followed by a puppet wielding a giant pair of scissors. A single Card soldier who had served as their rearguard crawled out after that, and then the crack quietly sealed shut.
"Hah... hah... I thought... I was going to die..."
Her heart was still pounding furiously. Ripper—Uno Silver's contracted spirit—was a Sacred Spirit with the extremely rare power to manipulate space. The Sacred Spirit inhabiting Uno's puppet was the only Monster Uno commanded, and in times of need, it served as the Thousand Demons' Parade's lifeline.
But this was the first time she'd used it during a retreat, and the first time she'd activated its power so many times in succession.
Adler and Quint tumbled off Yuden's head, collapsing onto their backs.
Uno had been focused purely on defense, so she was still holding up, but the two of them had participated in the fighting directly—their exhaustion must have been even worse.
The new Sacred Tree Passage army that had taken so much effort to assemble had suffered devastating losses. But the fact that all the Guides were still alive was nothing short of a miracle.
Adler threw down his spear, his body soaked with blood and sweat, and spoke wearily.
"A draw, was it... I really thought we could win."
"They were a bit too strong, huh? I can't believe even the Star-Eating Centipede and the Sacred Tree Passage Monsters, all enhanced with Mana Material, couldn't do it—y'know, out in the regular world, we would've been undefeated for a while."
"They're way too damn strong! I know it was a chaotic battle, but for Zork to get killed... are the Phantoms actually stronger than Monsters?"
Quint spat out the words. His tone was brave enough, but his face was deathly pale.
Zork had been Quint's right-hand Monster ever since he'd contracted it. The shock of losing it might have hit harder than the fact that all his freshly acquired soldiers had been slaughtered.
At first, it had looked like they were evenly matched. The Monsters Adler had acquired in the Sacred Tree Passage truly did possess power rivaling that of the Phantom army.
The problem was the leading Phantom—the knight in crimson armor. Remembering the way that thing had fought, Adler shuddered.
It was clearly no ordinary Phantom. The other Phantoms had also been top-class among everything Adler and his forces had faced before, but this one was in a completely different league.
"That was the Phantom of some renowned ancient knight, no doubt about it. Over-reproduced by the power of ultra-high-density Mana Material... A nightmare manifestation, that one."
There was both fear and excitement mingled in his voice.
Powerful Mystic Beasts and Monster Beasts he'd just contracted had been slaughtered one-sidedly. Numbers mattered in a horde, but individual powerhouses mattered even more. If you could thin the enemy's ranks without losses, your own horde gained the advantage.
The Star-Eating Centipede Yuden, the Dark Cyclops, and Zork were all Monsters capable of being one-against-a-thousand fighters, but Yuden and Zork showed their true value less in one-on-one combat and more against entire armies. That hadn't been a problem until now, but it seemed they'd been too complacent.
They'd managed to crush the enemy through sheer numbers, but Yuden had lost everything below his neck, and Zork had been killed in battle.
The new demon army they'd spent an entire week preparing in the Sacred Tree Passage, the Card soldiers that Quint had cheerfully negotiated for—all that remained was a single unit. In terms of results, their fighting strength was devastated.
Adler covered his eyes with his arm and spoke bitterly.
"Just a little more... just a little more! If even one more Monster had survived, I could have broken through Thousand Transformations' composure!"
"Unlike Phantoms, Monsters are finite, after all... And there's no easy way to find more."
Thousand Transformations had merely widened their eyes slightly upon witnessing the clash between their own forces and the Thousand Demons' Parade, and not a trace of panic had surfaced on their face. If anything, when they'd realized it, they'd already vanished from the battlefield.
Whether that was born of confidence, or the belief that Phantoms could be replenished easily, or simply a lack of interest in the fight itself—who could say.
But one thing was certain: Uno and the others hadn't even registered in their eyes.
She took a deep breath and checked the scissors Ripper was holding. The space-slitting scissors glowed a deep crimson and were riddled with cracks.
Ripper's ability was powerful, but it couldn't be used continuously. She might get one or two more uses out of it.
"Lord Adler, what do we do? Ripper can probably only manage one more use."
Once those scissors shattered, it would take time for them to regenerate. That meant if they were caught in a desperate situation again, escape would be impossible.
Regardless of the outcome, they'd exhausted everything they had in this clash. In response to Uno's question, Adler, still lying flat on his back, looked over at Yuden beside him.
Yuden was calmly alive despite having lost most of his body. Given time, he would regenerate and be ready to fight again.
"Yeah... fighting any further really would be too dangerous, wouldn't it. To think he can even command Phantoms—that man. Never would've guessed a Guide like that existed."
Even Uno and the others couldn't command Phantoms... or rather, that thought had never even occurred to them.
Phantoms and Monsters were things that resembled each other but were fundamentally different.
Quint looked surprised to see Adler in such an uncharacteristically reflective mood.
Adler closed his eyes for a while, lost in thought, then nodded deeply as though he'd made up his mind and said something incredible.
"Alright, I've made my decision! I've learned that there's potential in wielding new power. So let's go ask Thousand Transformations to teach us how to command Phantoms!"
"You're joking, right?! We just fought the guy!"
"They say strike while the iron's hot, don't they? Besides, there seem to be powerful Phantoms here worthy of joining my demon army. That man probably won't mind if we go ask."
It was true—being able to lead the nearly inexhaustible stream of Phantoms would make them virtually invincible. Just thinking about it raised numerous problems, but it could become a tremendous asset for the Thousand Demons' Parade. If things went well.
Seeing Adler shrug and declare this so definitively, Quint blinked several times before— "...You're right. If we could command the Phantom that defeated Zork, it would make Zork's sacrifice worth it."
Wait—she was going to use her last Ripper charge for that?!
Shuddering at the bad premonition, Uno watched as Adler furrowed his brow and continued.
"Besides... that knight, right before Yuden was about to tear him apart, said something. Even if he himself was destroyed, the god's resurrection could not be stopped. There's more to that Phantom. If we can find and subdue it first—once the power of a god joins our forces, our army will be invincible!"
"O-oh! Let's do it, Adler! We can do it! It'll be a funeral battle!"
A Phantom of a god. Truly... truly, if things went well, it would be an unparalleled boost to their fighting strength. But how could they possibly believe they could command the Phantom of a god—a being so powerful that merely defeating it would earn legendary status? Uno and the others didn't even know how to command Phantoms in the first place.
Watching the impassioned Adler and the already-being-swayed Quint, Uno hastily screamed out.
"Please, just stop! I am absolutely not going!"