Thanks to you all, we've reached 100 episodes and our one-year anniversary!
When I started this work on a whim, I never imagined it would go this far!
That's all thanks to you readers who have been following this story.
I hope you'll continue to enjoy "The Reincarnator's Adventure" from here on out.
We've psyched ourselves up again and made our way to the entrance.
And walking beside me once more as my attendant is Gramps.
Three people are lined up on the opposing team, and since all three are registered members, one of the two non-Tamer members must be serving as their attendant.
This time, the opposing team had arrived first, but we barely exchanged glances with them.
The reason is simple—the opposing team's Tamer was glaring right at us. I don't recall doing anything to earn such a glare, and it certainly wasn't a pleasant feeling, but since the match was about to start, I figured he wasn't stupid enough to cause a scene, so I just ignored it.
Amid that subtly tense atmosphere, the sealed entrance opened, and we all stepped onto the Fighting Stage together.
Normally, we'd release our Familiars from our bags before stepping onto the stage, but this was the first time both teams had more Familiars than human members. Since there was concern that the Familiars might get worked up and start attacking each other, the organizers requested that we first go up onto the stage with only the human members, then release our Familiars once both teams had created some distance between them.
When we advanced to the center of the stage, Gramps and the opposing team's warrior exchanged bows and stepped back off.
However, only the opposing team's warrior was permitted to remain inside the venue, and he moved to the outer area behind his team's side.
This was because the warrior was a registered member of the opposing team—the key difference between him and Gramps, who wasn't registered for the match.
Then, once we'd each created some distance, we released our Familiars from our bags.
Shiromaru and Solomon burst out in a burst of energy. Slarin and Namitaro emerged from their bags at a more leisurely pace.
The opposing team's Cyclops and Troll lumbered out, rolling their shoulders and loosening up their bodies. The black Wyvern subspecies had initially walked out as well, but after spreading its wings wide, it took to the sky.
Seeing the Familiars of both teams appear all at once, the venue erupted with the loudest cheers of the day.
Those cheers continued for some time, to the point where the King's pre-match "gracious words" couldn't even get started.
Both teams' formations—
Orasion
stood in a horizontal line, left to right: Namitarou, Solomon, me, Shiromaru, and Slarin.
Facing them,
Dendrobates
had their vanguard lined up left to right as Cyclops, Wyvern, and Troll, with the mage a few meters behind them, and the Tamer behind the mage.
"Team Battle Finals! Orasion versus Dendrobates… begin!"
The referee declared the match started and immediately backed away.
However, before the referee had fully retreated, Cyclops, Wyvern, Troll—and I—all charged forward.
My sudden dash drew a wave of murmurs from the crowd.
But the ones even more surprised were the members of the opposing team. A Tamer charging in for a blitz attack was something that essentially never happened.
What's more, every member on my side besides me was a Familiar, which meant if I went down, Orasion would automatically lose the match.
The Cyclops and the others probably didn't understand any of that, but they were visibly rattled by the murmuring from the crowd and the reactions of the Tamers behind them, their movements slightly sluggish.
I didn't let that opening slip away and closed in on the Troll.
"Hyah!"
I threw two consecutive low kicks straight into its shins. The Troll, hit by searing pain, instinctively grabbed the leg that had been kicked.
As the Troll's face dipped down, I scrambled up its back and smashed my fist into the back of its head. That one blow didn't render the Troll completely unconscious, but it could no longer stand properly.
The Wyvern lunged at me as I moved to finish the Troll off, but Solomon slammed into it from the side and knocked the attack off course.
However, the Wyvern's charge forced me to pull back from the Troll, and in that gap, the Cyclops was already on top of me.
———SOLOMON'S SIDE: Solomon vs. Wyvern Subspecies————
Solomon successfully deflected the Wyvern subspecies' attack away from Tenma with his body slam. Better yet, he managed to shift the Wyvern subspecies' target onto himself, so the plan was going well so far.
"Gugaaaaaaah!"
Being interfered with by someone smaller than itself had sent the Wyvern subspecies into a blind rage.
In the natural world, it would be unthinkable for a Wyvern to charge at a Dragon—a species far superior to itself.
However, this Wyvern subspecies did not think like a normal one. Naturally, the Tamer's orders played a part. But more than that, this Wyvern subspecies was supremely confident in its own power.
*'I am no ordinary Wyvern.'*
This Wyvern subspecies had been a powerhouse from the moment it was born. That was not because Wyverns as a species were strong—it was because it was something special.
The Wyvern species was said to be closely related to Dragons.
But when it came to raising their young, Wyverns were nothing like Dragons.
Highly intelligent Dragons, unless something extraordinary happened, would stay by their children's side and look after them until they were capable of surviving on their own.
Wyverns, however, once their young reached a certain size, no longer saw them as offspring—just as another member of their own kind.
Because of that, it was not uncommon for a parent to devour its own child. Even short of that, a parent would simply abandon its young as though it had lost all interest.
This Wyvern subspecies had nearly been eaten by its own parent. Instead, it had turned the tables and killed the parent. Having tasted the flesh of its own kind, it then went on a killing spree, devouring the Wyverns that lived nearby.
Furthermore, in the territory where this Wyvern subspecies made its home, there was nothing stronger than a Wyvern—making it an utterly invincible ruler.
Because of all this, the Wyvern subspecies had absolute confidence in its own strength.
But even for this Wyvern subspecies, there had been a miscalculation: the grimy collar fastened around its neck. Because of it, despite being a ruler, it was now reduced to the slave of a creature that looked like a monkey.
When it tried to resist, the collar made it impossible to move as it wished, and worse still, agonizing pain would surge through its body.
For these reasons, the Wyvern subspecies had grown even more ferocious than before it had been captured, driven mad by stress.
And now, a creature much like itself was charging straight at it.
Solomon, soaring through the air in its own territory just as it did, provoked a fury in the Wyvern subspecies that even it did not understand.
This was because the instinct within it as a Wyvern did not understand that it was feeling fear toward a Dragon of superior species rank — it only registered as an unnamed emotion piercing through its heart like a needle, which became the root cause of its frustration.
The Wyvern subspecies had convinced itself of a simpler explanation: "This smaller creature is defiantly resisting me in my own territory — that is why."
Having body-slammed the Wyvern subspecies, Solomon flew away, putting distance between itself and Tenma.
The Wyvern subspecies, its blood boiling with rage, could now see nothing but Solomon fleeing right before its eyes.
The aerial chase continued along the same pattern: the Wyvern subspecies, slightly faster in speed, would close in and attempt to snap its jaws on Solomon each time it entered range, while Solomon skillfully dodged every attack.
You might think it could simply breathe fire, but at such high speeds, recklessly spitting flame risked engulfing itself — not a wise move. At least, for the Wyvern subspecies, rather than breathing fire to deal damage, biting to deal direct damage was the better way of demonstrating...
...to its opponent...
...its own strength — or so it seemed to think.
Solomon, fleeing for its life, was beginning to show signs of panic, its movements growing slightly erratic.
It had dodged every attack so far, but with the Wyvern subspecies on its tail, Solomon could think of no way to strike back.
Unable to focus on evasion any longer, it finally happened — the Wyvern subspecies's...
...fangs...
...grazed Solomon's tail. Solomon scrambled to refocus on dodging.
But the impact of the attack threw off its balance, and it was too slow to escape the Wyvern subspecies's reach.
The Wyvern subspecies threw its jaws wide open to bite down, but just then...
"Ugah! Ugaah!"
The panicked voice of the Cyclops rang out from below. And in the very next instant...
"Fish Style,
hadoho
ooooo!"
Along with that slightly drawn-out voice, a flash of light shot from the ground toward the Wyvern subspecies.
——SIDE Namitarou——
(Man, those guys don't even look like they'd put up a fight.)
Namitarou watched Tenma overwhelming a troll with his bare hands and thought as much.
Well, when it came to the gap in strength between Tenma (& Namitarou) and a troll, it was no wonder he thought that way.
Among everyone currently in this venue, the only person who could probably beat Namitarou was Tenma alone.
(Oh wait, while I'm standing around thinking about this, Solomon's getting chased down. Shiromaru and Slarin are... messing around playing with magic users... tough break for him.)
To Namitarou, Tenma was a friend and, in a sense, family. Because of that, the framework of "Tenma's family is my family" had taken shape, and he (unilaterally) considered Slarin and the rest to be his little siblings.
So when Tenma asked him to cover for Solomon, he took it on without a second thought.
(So anyway...) "Namitarou, heading out!"
Namitarou set off to help Solomon.
Needless to say, Namitarou was a carp. Not just any ordinary carp, but his species was still a carp all the same. So naturally, he couldn't fly.
However, Namitarou had
power
that was given to him by the gods.
And there was also a secret known only to Namitarou and the gods—one he had never told Tenma about.
Namitarou had been a wild carp in his previous life, having lived for over a thousand years. Even as a wild carp, living for a thousand years or more would cause one to transform into something akin to a yokai.
But Namitarou was different. To his surprise, he had obtained divine status and become, in a sense, a being known as a divine beast.
And using the power of a divine beast, he swam around through the ponds, lakes, rivers, and seas across the world.
Those days had been so incredibly fun, but as science eventually developed, he found himself increasingly unable to swim around freely.
Still, perhaps if he had fled to the deep sea, he could have swum around freely. However, the deep sea was not suited for Namitarou.
The deep-sea fish were desperate just to survive, and upon seeing Namitarou, they could only perceive him as either food or a predator. Furthermore, many of them were gloomy fish, so there were virtually no cheerful companions for Namitarou to talk to.
And above all else, the food didn't agree with him.
No mountain delicacies ever drifted down into the deep sea, and for Namitarou, who had grown up in the mountains, it was unbearable.
That was why, in the end, he had moved to a pond deep in the mountains.
As the boring days continued, death eventually came for Namitarou as well.
And after he died, the gods picked him up.
Just as they had with Tenma, the gods wished to give Namitarou a new body as well. Among the options for a new body, a human form was available, but Namitarou chose the familiar
fish body
he was accustomed to.
For that reason, the gods created a new body based on the one most compatible with Namitarou—
his previous life's body
—and bestowed it upon him.
Because of that, Namitarou is the koi closest to the gods in this world. Although, having reincarnated in this world, he has lost the power of his former life, even so, in a sense, this body is higher-performing than Tenma's.
One of Namitarou's hidden techniques erupts.
Swimming across the Fighting Stage as if gliding through water, Namitarou moved into an easier position to aim, concentrated Magic Power in his mouth, and shouted the name of his technique.
"Fish-style, Hadōhooooo!"
The origin was, of course,
that thing.
It was technically a type of breath attack, but in Namitarou's opinion, this name was easier to work with, so he gave it this name instead.
The name of the technique sounds like a joke, but if he fired it at full power just a few times, the Royal Capital would fall.
It possessed power on par with Tenma's "Tempest," and in terms of penetrating force, it surpassed Tempest—Namitarou's ultimate trump card.
Well, firing it at full power would obviously cause far too much devastation, so he had reduced its power to less than one-tenth.
"Hado-ho" struck only the Wyvern subspecies. It didn't cause a complete crash, but it dealt massive damage.
"Damn… I held back too much."
Having intended to finish it in one blow, Namitarou was about to fire another Hado-ho.
However, before Namitarou could act, Solomon executed a large vertical loop in midair and, building up momentum, slammed into the back of the Wyvern subspecies.
The Wyvern subspecies was sent crashing to the ground, and the aerial battle was decided.
The fallen Wyvern subspecies had completely lost consciousness and would not be able to rejoin the match.
"You did it, Solomon!"
At Namitarou's words, Solomon let out a cry and performed a spiraling flight.
——— SIDE Slarin & Shiromaru ———
After Tenma launched forward, Shiromaru took off running with Slarin riding on his back.
The target was the mage.
As he dashed past the Cyclops along the way, an attack was launched at him, but the Cyclops couldn't keep up with Shiromaru's momentum-driven speed, and the attack missed entirely.
Shiromaru closed in on the mage and opened his jaws to bite down—but the mage had also finished chanting a defensive spell.
The spell unleashed was a Firestorm. The mage had likely chosen an area-of-effect attack to ensure it would hit Shiromaru.
Released at the perfect timing, the Firestorm engulfed Shiromaru.
Even for Shiromaru, wrapped in fur with magic resistance, a direct hit should have been impossible to walk away from without damage… or so it should have been.
The instant Shiromaru was thought to be engulfed in flames, the fire burst apart.
What emerged from the flames was a translucent, spherical object — an Emperor Slarin.
Since the Slarin's body was mostly made of water, it enlarged itself to shield Shiromaru and blasted the flames away at the same time.
However, the recoil caused the Slarin's body to shrink slightly, having evaporated some of its moisture.
Seeing that, the Mage unleashed a barrage of fire-attribute spells, but Shiromaru nimbly dodged each one.
The Slarin instantly shrank and clung to Shiromaru's body so it wouldn't be shaken off.
Seeing that the Mage's attacks couldn't connect, the Tamer also joined the assault. The Tamer's decision came late, but by joining in, they gradually began to push Shiromaru and the others back.
The spells themselves were at a level that hardly affected Shiromaru, but they were tough on the Slarin.
So Shiromaru chose to prevent the Slarin from taking hits rather than to take down the Mage.
Once Shiromaru committed solely to dodging, the Tamer and the Mage's attack spells began missing by wider and wider margins.
The scales, which had briefly started to tip toward the Tamer's side, swung back once more, creating a kind of stalemate.
But then —
"Ugah! Ugaaaah!"
Along with the Cyclops's sudden roar, the Wyvern subspecies was swallowed by a flash of light and smashed to the ground by Solomon, collapsing the situation in an instant.
As a result, the Tamer and the Mage reflexively turned their attention to the Wyvern subspecies, losing sight of Shiromaru and the others.
"Gufuh!"
"Damn it!"
The moment their attention wavered, the Mage took a direct hit from the Slarin's Fireball and collapsed.
The Fireball also lunged at the Tamer, but it was narrowly dodged at the very last step.
Shiromaru quickly closed in on the fallen Mage and struck it with a forepaw.
The Mage, caught between Shiromaru's paw pad and the stone-tiled stage, lost consciousness and was finished for this year's tournament.
"Troll! Cyclops! Help me!"
The Tamer, panicked at finding himself alone with no one left around him, cried out for help—and at that very moment, a massive tremor shook the ground as the Cyclops toppled backward onto the ground.
———SIDE: Tenma———
While Solomon was battling the Wyvern subspecies in the air and Slarin and Shiromaru were handling the Mage, Tenma had been continuously dodging the attacks of both the Cyclops and the Troll.
(This Cyclops is surprisingly skilled at fighting...)
After I'd gone in for the finishing blow on the Troll, the Cyclops had intervened, and the Troll had quickly gotten back up to attack alongside the Cyclops.
Still, the Troll was on the verge of being knocked out, so it wasn't all that frightening—it looked weak enough to be finished off at any moment, and the Cyclops was covering for it well.
The Cyclops's unexpected tenacity impressed me, but I wasn't feeling particularly threatened.
Against the fists of the two giants charging at me, I continued landing strikes methodically.
For example, the base of the thumb, the pinky, the joints of the wrist... By concentrating my attacks on these points, even light hits became highly effective, and gradually the two giants grew afraid to come after me.
After all, every time they swung their fists, the pain only increased. Even a low-intelligence creature like the Troll naturally learns when pain is involved. If even the Troll was like that, then the Cyclops would be no exception.
When the two giants started to hesitate, the Cyclops suddenly let out a loud roar toward the sky. It sounded almost like a warning of some kind.
And then a flash of light streaked across, and the Wyvern subspecies came crashing down.
The impact of the Wyvern subspecies falling caused the Troll to lash out in a half-baked attack—probably a reflexive reaction.
I used the Troll's descending fist as a launching platform, leapt into the air, took rough aim, and unleashed a spinning roundhouse kick.
It was a technique that was hard to land and impractical against a human opponent, but its power was immense, making it perfectly suited against a large, slow-moving target like the Troll.
Just as I'd planned, the kick connected squarely with the Troll's temple.
Even the Troll couldn't withstand that—its massive body crumpled to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut.
Without even checking on the Troll, I closed in on the Cyclops and pressed my attack.
The Cyclops fought back, but its large body worked against it. In close quarters, where footwork mattered, the fight steadily became one-sided.
Chapter 477: The Wyvern's Rampage
Deciding it was time to finish things off, I feinted a jumping motion, and the Cyclops, wary of the kick from before, crossed its arms over its head to guard.
However, instead of leaping upward, I lunged forward, closing the distance straight into the Cyclops' guard.
Then, crouching low and raising my fist, I exploded upward with all the momentum I could muster — unleashing what's known as a frog punch.
The Cyclops had only been on guard against an attack from above and hadn't predicted an assault coming from below. Its jaw was left completely wide open, and my fist punched clean through the Cyclops' head from underneath.
The Cyclops, its head snapped violently backward, seemed to lose consciousness from the single blow. It toppled backward, arms and legs splayed out, and crashed to the ground.
At the moment the Cyclops fell, the Tamer appeared to be shouting something, but the sound of the Cyclops hitting the floor drowned it out before it could reach my ears.
With this, the only one capable of fighting with Dendrobates was the Tamer, and we repositioned ourselves in a semicircle, surrounding him.
The Tamer, trying to avoid being boxed in, was approaching the downed Wyvern subspecies, apparently intending to use it as cover for his back.
Seeing this, Shiromaru moved to launch an attack on the Tamer. He closed to within two or three steps, ready to pounce — and then, for some reason, Shiromaru suddenly braced himself and slammed on the brakes.
And in the next instant, tragedy struck.
"Grrraaaaah!"
"Hah…"
The Wyvern subspecies, which had suddenly awakened, clamped its massive jaws around the upper body of the Tamer — its own master — and tore him apart.
The arena was engulfed in a moment of dead silence.
During that brief lull, the Wyvern subspecies chewed on what remained of the Tamer and swallowed it whole.
"Gwraaaaaaaah!"
Having finished its meal, the Wyvern subspecies rose to its feet, spread its wings wide, and let out a thunderous roar.
The majority of the audience, upon hearing that roar, screamed and stampeded toward the exits in a desperate bid to flee the arena. Chaos erupted everywhere.
In response to the crowd's cries, the Wyvern subspecies turned its gaze toward the Audience Seats and spat a fireball into the stands.
There were three fireballs. The moment the Wyvern subspecies opened its mouth, I broke into a run, but because it was the farthest one away, I couldn't make it in time.
Of the three fireballs, Solomon knocked one away with a body tackle, and another veered off course away from the Audience Seats.
The last one barreled straight toward the Audience Seats, but just before impact, the mages' barrier arrived in time, and no casualties occurred.
Having stopped every single fireball, the Wyvern subspecies let out a growl and soared into the sky.
Solomon, who had been handling the aerial defense, had crashed from using his own body as a shield, leaving no one to block the Wyvern subspecies's path.
Perhaps realizing this, the Wyvern subspecies wore a satisfied expression on its face.