Volume 1 Chapter 26 Horace VS Astral Dragon Gai Gigant III (Conclusion)
It's all one-sided slaughter.
When Gai Gigant fires its breath, it gets overwritten by the air, and when it swings claws or tail, the armor just bounces it off.
But when Horace swings his sword, he cuts through scales, and when he fires bullets, they pierce that tough body.
And even Gai Gigant, which can move super fast at close range, can't dodge... no, it can't even react fast enough──he attacks way faster than reflexes can catch.
Basically... 'the level difference is real.'
"Hmm. I added that 'extra' to boost it up, and it's pretty damn good. Still, the 'bone golem' performance is *just* pushed into 'calculation power'... no, I should say, I slightly loosen the limiter, shifting the 'cube's' power from 'range extension' to 'calculation expansion' to really use it."
Horace mumbles as he looks at the sword and gun he's holding.
"Since I'm using them before the magic stabilization is perfect, yeah. Still, I'd say it's *almost* full power. Not quite 'serious' yet, but..."
He repositions his sword and gun again.
If you take his words at face value, he's now focusing all the bone golem's 'power' into 'calculation power', and not stabilizing it.
And on top of that, the cube──a small 3-centimeter-side cube he's using──he's also using for 'calculations.'
Horace's golem control's range is about 3 meters radius, but that probably includes the 'range extension' of the cube's function, meaning his actual control radius by himself is smaller.
Before deploying armor, the goal was to 'quickly stabilize the magic.'
The 'calculation expansion' of the cube was probably used to assist the golem in stabilizing.
So, basically, the big difference between now and before is how *optimized* Horace's body is for battle, thanks to that armor.
"Well, might as well not drag this out too long."
He stows his sword and gun into Item Box, then pulls out another sword.
The design still feels mechanically futuristic, no change there.
But it's a single-edged 2-handed sword.
Horace swings it in a clean horizontal slash.
Crescent-shaped magic energy surged out, heading for Gai Gigant.
It tried to block with its tail... but it was cut off in one strike.
"?"
"That won't stop it."
Enormous magic spilled out from the sword.
But if you look closely, each one is a tiny magic circle.
"..."
"Can't even say anything anymore? I get it... hmm?"
Magic gathers in Gai Gigant's mouth.
It's giving off a pressure so dense, it's way beyond before.
Moreover, all the purple magic overflowing its entire body is flooding into its mouth.
"Full body and soul... huh?"
The first to attack was Gai Gigant.
It unleashes a breath that makes the surrounding air tremble just from being released.
"If only it wasn't on a different level... that's the limit of a dragon without study."
Just before the breath hits Horace, it swings its sword up.
A swift slash is fired again, overwriting the breath into air, heading for Gai Gigant.
Whole body, full spirit, basically, even knowing it's coming, there's no way to run.
The slash cuts through Gai Gigant's body like tofu and keeps going upward.
When it hits the cloudy sky, it kicks all the clouds away, revealing clear weather.
"Hmm..."
Gai Gigant's body turns to dust, leaving behind tons of gold coins and a single ingot.
"Gold coins... about ten thousand. Took advantage of Gai Gigant's magic going crazy to turn most of its resources into loot. Yeah, that's about right."
Horace takes off the cube connected to his left waist, storing the 'Deus Ex Machina,' then kneels to pick up the ingot.
"This quality... still 4th best, I guess. Well, can't be helped."
Tucking the ingot into the back of his coat, Horace walks toward the capital.
* * *
The fight ended quickly after Horace deployed his armor, but the people in the capital watched from the walls and windows of tall buildings, witnessing the battle between Horace and Gai Gigant.
They got an order from the world conference headquarters: 'The Astral Dragon Gai Gigant has shown up, and the hero's master will take it down, so just focus on evacuating.' Whether they actually managed to evacuate is... let's say 'dicey'. But they sure saw how strong Horace was.
At first, they thought he was 'about even, maybe a bit below' the dragon.
When Gai Gigant unleashed its first full-force breath attack on the capital, they went nuts for a moment.
But once Horace deployed his armor, it was just too one-sided.
This guy, he's the 'hero's master'.
The one who trained the hero who defeated the Demon Lord and saved the world.
It didn't take long for everyone to get that.
And then there's the fact that 'this Horace worked as a handyman and did paperwork in the castle for ten years'.
The story of how he used his 'weakling status' imposed by the Demon Lord to his advantage, playing the part of a mere commoner, even filing hundreds of complaints a day, was chilling the spines of the capital's commoners.
Overall, you could say things settled down.
By the way, the 10,000 gold coins Horace got from this fight? He said 'he's leaving all 10,000 coins right there', hoping they'll be used to repair the damage, so the capital should be fixed up soon.
So, the end for those snobby little nobles who couldn't recognize a 'hero'? Zero dead (Deed's keeping quiet so as not to make a big deal of it, and the sorcery guys who became Gai Gigant's revival sacrifice got buried in the dark), just some buildings knocked down. Pretty anticlimactic.
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