Chapter 98: Madame Eight Legs (5)
<Madame 'Eight Legs'>
Risk Rating : S
Size : ?
Found in: Ridge 10, Red and Black Mountains
-Nicknamed 'Madame of Dephts'. Her exact race name is unknown.
In the distant past, the most terrible beings that inhabited the depths of the Oil Pole Hell were spiders of immense size, and it is believed that Madame Eight-Legged is a distant descendant that retains the form of those giant spiders that lived in the ancient past.
Their bodies are filled with a disgusting venom, and their webs are stronger than steel, unbreakable by anything but the infernal fires of the Underworld.
Vikir looked up at the giant queen spider before him.
Indeed. Facing this overwhelming force, he understood why Balak's warriors had been so worried and frightened.
Before leaving Balak, Aquila had expressed concern.
"'There is not much known about the Madame. Only the shaman Ahheman knew more, but now that he's gone....'
But. There was one thing Aquila didn't know.
Ahheman was from the Rokoko, a tribe of shamans, and as such, he was familiar with the ancient creatures.
And Vikir had recently acquired a number of secret documents from a group of Rokoko who had fled the plague during the Red Death.
Surprisingly, among the documents were important books that the Rokoko shaman hadn't taken with him during his hasty flight from the plague, including a detailed analysis of the creatures of the depht.
It contained information on rare beasts such as the "Swamp Salamander" and the "Bone-Sucking Mosquito," and the Madame of Depht was no exception.
-We don't know exactly what kind of monster she is.
However, she is similar in appearance to the giant, terrifying spiders of history books from the distant past, and is expected to transform into such a creature as she grows older.
-For now, she lives alone and isolated in a forsaken land between the low hills beyond the Red and Black Mountains and the shores of the cold, harsh Sea of Ruin.
But unlike in the old days, when she kept to herself, these days she seems to be thinking about crossing the borders of the Red and Black Mountains.
-The Madame of Water is always hungry, and her voracious appetite, combined with her fierce cunning and great strength, means that neither her enemies nor any other creature in the Black Mountain Ecosystem will be able to stop her.
-And neither will we. We must prepare for the nightmare that may soon be upon us. The horrors of water!
Vikir looked at Madame Eight-Legged as he recalled this and other information.
Her plump body expanded and contracted as she exhaled and inhaled.
The black-green poisonous fog that emanated from her body formed a thick veil, beyond which eight red eyes pierced Vikir's entire body.
[Jaaaaack...!]
Madame Eight-Legged reacted first.
She raised her massive forelegs and slammed them into the ground.
...Thud!
The floor wrinkled, and then a huge wave rose up and crashed over Vikir.
Shattered bones, rotting flesh, spider webs, and fecal matter all mixed together in a hot, fermenting mass.
Faced with this wave of disgust, Vikir can only laugh bitterly.
"Good thing I skipped dinner."
If I had eaten, I would have gotten rid of it.
Even Vikir, who has a strong squeamishness, thinks, "I'm glad I didn't eat dinner."
Puff puff puff!
Vikir flung himself out of the way of the wave.
He couldn't dodge them casually.
The slightest opening and he'd sink to the bottom of the shifting ground, or get kicked by Madame Eightlegs' extra kicks.
Vikir leaped upward, landing on the massive ribs of something towering over him.
Karak-
The archery skills taught to you by Aiyen shine through.
Madame Eight-Legged flinched slightly as Vikir's arrow sliced through the air.
She had been wounded herself during the raid on Balak's village.
It was a minor one, but she had no choice but to react as if it were a nuisance to have hard-to-remove thorns embedded in her body.
Madame ducked slightly backwards to avoid an arrow flying towards her eye.
Sssssss...
An infernal darkness enveloped her like a shroud.
Madame's exhalation turned into a thick poisonous fog, adding an inky blackness to the darkness that almost completely obscured her body.
Rumbling-bang!
If it weren't for the thunderbolt that struck at just the right time.
...Flash!
In an instant, a single bolt of lightning bathed everything in white light.
It was obvious how cunningly Madame had been preparing for her next attack while crouching in the darkness.
The moment she stretches upwards, her silhouette is revealed in the white light.
Boom!
Vikir stabbed an arrow into the gap in the center.
It was like baking beans in a fire.
In that brief moment of light, Vikir was able to see beyond the darkness and put the arrow right on target.
The bull's-eye was Madame's left eye.
CRACK!
The sound of a red glass ball shattering.
The arrow had landed squarely in Madame's skull.
[Jaaaaaah!?]
Madame panicked as one of her eight eyes suddenly burned black.
At that very moment, another thunderbolt struck.
...Flash!
Another bolt of lightning.
The light became a beacon to guide Vikir's second arrow.
Crackle.
Madame's missing eye became two.
The flash of light was followed exactly seven seconds later by a loud boom.
...Boom!
The sound followed slightly later than the light, and by the time it exploded, Vikir was once again preparing for her next attack.
"Two empty left eyeballs."
Vikir deliberately targeted only the left side of Madame's face.
The two eyeballs on her left side are currently pierced by arrows, so that's her blind spot.
Like a seasoned hound, Vikir made a quick judgment call, and it paid off.
The Madame hesitated as Vikir turned to the left, sensing that she had lost sight of the enemy.
Taking advantage of the moment, Vikir drew his magic sword, Beelzebub, and unleashed a blast of Graduator-grade aura.
Baskervillian Carnivore.
Six teeth blazed with aura as thick as blood.
Quack, quack, quack!
The long slash created a huge crack.
The sound of hard chitinous armor shattering and the squishy flesh inside being torn apart.
Denggeng!
With a loud bang, Madame's left front leg was severed.
[Jaaaaah!]
Madame screamed with her whole body, through the many breathing holes in her body.
But that wasn't the end of it.
Thud!
Vikir's blow cut through the air like a whip, severing not only one of Madame's front legs, but also the mucous sac at the back of her lower belly, where the cobwebs were coming out.
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzz...
The cobwebs began to leak.
I prepared for a follow-up blow as Madame stumbled backwards, dripping with slime.
Once the attack was successful, the hunt was relentless.
Once you have the upper hand, you can't let go.
But.
"...?"
Vikir paused, about to strike.
The old hound's instincts were screaming. Back off now!
Without hesitation, Vikir surrendered to his instincts.
On the battlefield, it is often wiser to listen to instinct than to reason.
Right then.
...Pow!
Vikir's back snapped into a G-shape.
Madame's killing intent had overtaken his instincts.
Where did it come from?
From an unexpected place, another of Madame's legs shot out and slammed into Vikir's body.
"...!"
Vikir saw it clearly as his body buckled under the impact.
The Madame's legs that he had cut off earlier had suddenly regenerated.
And two of them!
[Jarrarak-kick-]
Madame raised her left front leg as if to mock Vikir.
To Vikir's surprise, it was split in two, starting at the same point where it had been severed.
In other words, two new legs had grown from where it had been severed.
Madame's absurdly powerful regenerative powers make such a thing possible.
Her legs had a bizarre structure where the more you cut, the more you grow.
Quack! ...Puck!
Vikir crashed to the ground, buried like garbage in a pile of bones.
Madame's legs turned Bikir's body, which was forged by the blessing of the River Styx, into rags.
The stomach skin was ripped open, all the intestines leaked out, and the right leg was completely cut off.
The bones of his left leg were shattered and bent into a rhomboid, and the impact had blinded him in one eye and ear.
In a single moment, a hero fell.
And Madame, who had reduced countless heroes to rotting lumps of flesh in the past, had done something similar this time.
[giggle giggle giggle...]
Madame sneers in triumph.
I could see her eyes, of which there were only six left, curling gently into a smirk.
...However.
Madame soon had to retract the mockery from her face.
"I didn't know that, so if you cut off a leg, it becomes two?"
Bikir casually brushed off his seat and stood up.
At the same time.
Tsutsutsutsuts...
Black steam began to rise from Vikir's entire body.
The sound and smell of burning flesh, and black smoke billowing out.
But it wasn't burning flesh, it was regenerating at a staggering rate.
A bog salamander.
The restorative powers of this monstrous amphibian, imbued in the magic sword Beelzebub, had completely rebuilt Vikir's body.
Finally, Vikir spoke.
" ... but this is within the margin of error."
With a voice cold enough to make Madame cringe, the hound began to barrel its teeth in earnest.
Updat𝓮d from freew𝒆bnovel(.)com