Whoooosh—
Golden sand surged behind Nirva’s back as he stood with his hands clasped.
From the empty air, a desert storm began /N_o_v_e_l_i_g_h_t/ to form.
Voooom.
The first to react was the Library Keeper.
A black body marked with golden circuits. A form not threatening yet not human, their face—if it could be called that—turned toward Nirva.
Shaaak!
The Library Keeper spread its wings wide.
When folded, one could not tell, but spread out, they resembled a great eagle.
Perhaps like a cocoon with wings.
Golden lasers shot from the Keeper’s face, aimed at Nirva.
Their only purpose: to guard this sacred library.
Whether Nirva was Dreamland’s ruler or an Apostle meant nothing to them.
Yet Nirva remained unharmed.
The rapidly rotating dome of golden sand around him deflected every incoming beam.
If Nirva’s figure could be seen standing calmly inside, the sand’s density could not be so great—
And yet the Library Keeper’s attacks never touched a hair on him.
It showed how overwhelming the power of Nirva’s dream-sand authority truly was.
“Hmph. Creatures that move without will—always such a bother.”
The Library Keepers differed from other Dreamland beings.
They were not truly alive, but closer to a manifested system.
Their role: guarding, arranging shelves and chambers.
In human terms, like red and white blood cells both.
But into this body, the most dreadful virus had invaded.
A demon—stronger than cancer, more devastating than radiation.
Nirva flicked his finger lightly.
The storm of dream-sand around him surged skyward, crashing down upon the Keepers.
Some dodged with evasive maneuvers, but others were swept away, dissolving into black mud.
The Keepers fired beams from every direction, but Nirva subdued them as if it were nothing.
Even knowing this was a dream-world, the sight felt unreal.
One Library Keeper crashed down near Seridan, its body reverting to mud.
“No! I wanted to study that one!”
“Can you really say that right now?!”
Hans shouted in disbelief at Seridan, who wanted to dissect one.
Why were the girls around here all like this? Bella Runa too.
After all, the Library Keepers were systems created by the mid-layer environment—
In some sense, not unlike highly advanced automatons.
Seridan’s curiosity in how they worked was only natural.
“But still, this doesn’t look so bad, does it? They seem to be fighting better than I thought.”
Hans found hope as more Keepers swarmed in.
If demons could be fought without their direct involvement, what more could one ask?
But Zantman and Ludger thought otherwise.
“It may look even now, but it’s only a matter of time.”
“Right. That old man hasn’t even begun to use real strength.”
Nirva’s casual flicks of a finger were not battle—he was toying with them.
Even while fighting, his gaze never left Ludger.
The Keepers’ attacks did not even warrant his attention.
And to prove it, Nirva snapped his fingers. Sand burst outward, engulfing them.
Struggling did no good—the dream-sand clung like honey.
Soon, it cocooned them.
Over five hundred Keepers were trapped in an instant.
Hans fell silent at the sight.
“Have you enjoyed your last amusement before death?”
Nirva’s eyes gleamed dangerously.
To look into those storm-swirling eyes was to feel swept into a gale.
He raised his hand, aiming at Ludger—
Ziiiing!
From inside some cocoons, strange noises rang, and yellow beams burst out.
“Heh.”
Nirva turned his head. Some Keepers were breaking free on their own.
But their response was strange.
Rather than blindly attack, they circled, gauging Nirva’s power.
“Why’d they suddenly go quiet?” Hans asked.
“Because they’ve measured his level.”
Ludger had seen the pattern.
“They’ve ‘learned’ their foe is far stronger.”
Just like the human body: immunity does not end with mere white blood cells.
Stronger defenses emerge depending on the threat.
So too with the Keepers.
A group clustered, merging into one massive body.
More than thirty fused into a single gigantic Keeper.
Its great yellow eye gathered immense energy.
“...Well then.”
Nirva’s voice carried no distress.
Fwoooosh!
A colossal beam, like a dragon’s breath, blasted toward him.
Much stronger than before.
This time Nirva used his whole hand, not just a finger.
He thrust forth his gloved palm, condensing the sand.
Compressed, smoothed, no longer sand but stone—
A golden shield, octagonal, engraved with beautiful patterns.
The massive beam struck, but the shield held firm.
And when Nirva pressed harder, it began to advance.
At this rate, the giant Keeper would be crushed.
But in that instant, a sharp magic arrow streaked toward Nirva’s temple.
“Interrupting a fight? How rude.”
Without turning, he caught it with his other hand.
Yet as he gripped it, his lips curved in surprise.
“Well now...”
KABOOM!
The arrow exploded in his hand.
The spell had been rigged from the start to detonate at the end.
A small blast, but at point-blank range, it could not be harmless.
Yet Nirva stood unharmed.
“Push him!”
At Ludger’s order, Sedina unleashed her spell.
She closed her eyes, focusing.
The green witch could control any plant.
But here in Dreamland, no real plants grew.
Still—that was no barrier.
Here, imagination was enough.
She pressed her hands to the ground.
The floor of the library swelled like a night sky rising.
Fwoosh!
Green stalks burst forth, writhing like flames.
At their tips opened vast maws with sharp fangs—
Giant flytraps, said to devour not only insects but beasts of the southern jungles.
Their teeth sank into Nirva’s body.
“Ticklish.”
With a flick, as if brushing dust from his coat, Nirva shattered them.
He stepped forward—only to find his leg stuck.
Looking down, sticky sundew clung to his sole.
A strike to buy but one second—
But one second was all Ludger needed.
Whoooosh!
The air froze to subzero in an instant.
Nirva tilted his head and murmured, “Now this won’t be ticklish.”
BOOOOM!
With a sound like a divine horn, an ice battleship fell upon Nirva’s head.
It crashed, shattering, ice shards flying, forming a frozen mountain.
The golden sand-shield crumbled.
The Keeper’s beam pierced through, striking the glacier’s heart.
CRAAACK!
The glacier split cleanly in two.
So too the Keeper’s beam, and even the giant Keeper itself.
From within, Nirva emerged unscathed, brushing frost from his clothes.
“Do you fools not respect the worth of books? To throw spells around blindly—one must always keep silence in a library.”
Ludger answered with another spell.
Rumble.
Lightning cracked across the sunlit ceiling.
Not illusion—storm clouds gathered, sparks of violet current flickering.
Each bolt became a blade, aimed at Nirva’s life.
Ten thousand in all.
Lightning-swords poured like rain.
And Nirva stood still.
Dust clouds rose, obscuring all.
Yet relief was impossible.
Demons were resilient beyond belief.
He had learned that when fighting Basara.
One had to keep pressing, never give them a chance to recover.
“Seridan! Ready!”
“Okay!”
Seridan scattered her bombs.
“Special high-power bombs, coming in hot!”
They fell into the stormcloud dust—detonating at once.
Brilliant light. Red fire spread.
“Sedina!”
“Yes!”
Ludger and Sedina cast together.
Ludger raised walls of stone, encircling the blast into a cauldron.
Sedina’s vines wove over it, sealing it tight.
The explosion roared within, unable to escape.
Heat so fierce it could vaporize steel in seconds.
Ludger shrank the cauldron, compressing its power.
Sedina lent her strength.
The vast furnace shrank to coffin size.
Superheat.
Superpressure.
Enough to turn graphite instantly to diamond.
More extreme than the mantle five hundred kilometers underground.
Only a Lord of Earth could survive it.
“I’ll add my part.”
Zantman drew dots into the dragon’s eye, dream energy turning to needles.
A hundred green needles pierced the coffin, bristling like a hedgehog.
Enough to kill even a master knight a hundred times over.
But Nirva, sovereign of Dreamland, could not be ended so.
“A pleasant struggle.”
He broke the prison apart, stepping out.
His clothes scorched, but nothing more.
Sedina’s lips trembled in despair.
Then yellow beams curved in from afar, raining upon Nirva.
More Library Keepers—reinforcements.
Not darting randomly, but calculating coordinates, firing with precision.
Nirva blocked them with ease.
Their attacks showed no sign of ending.
As Ludger prepared another spell, Nirva’s patience wore thin.
“Too many interruptions. I meant to finish earlier, but this grows tedious.”
His true goal: awakening the sleeping Goddess.
To waste time here risked giving Zero Order opportunity to act.
Even as ruler of Dreamland, he could not bend the environment entirely to his will—
Even now the mid-layer system resisted him.
“We must change venues. All of us.”
Nirva snapped his fingers once more.
The ground beneath Ludger and his allies rippled, then collapsed.
A sand-pit swallowed them past the knees, then the thighs.
“Why fight where the other side holds advantage?”
With those words, the pit consumed them whole.
In pitch blackness where no light reached, a single flash cut through.
Thus Ludger—
Fell deeper.
Down into the abyss beneath Dreamland.
