Author's Note: Okay so another chapter posted, Currently looking to see where I can find a place to read shield hero volume 20, or failing that listening to it. Either way, read, review, favourite, enjoy and stay safe.

Chapter 40: Spear and Dragon

The Aototsu tribe certainly played up their status among the top four hard. There were statues of dragons, of transformed Aototsu for all Setsuna knew, in fine marbles and gold inlays resembling the scales of a dragon. They were the first things that Setsuna destroyed, smashed apart into chunks of stone laced with gold like bits of sparkly rubble under the influence of her usual three part combo and made enough noise for several of the dragon men to come out and investigate.

"What took you guys so long?" Setsuna had taken several chunks of stone roughly the size of golf balls and lined them up in front of the little palace where the Aototsu had made their base of operations. "I got so bored waiting for you that I was just about to start a round of golf."

With a single swing of her spear Setsuna smashed the first of the stones straight through the head of one of the dragon men pulping it in the process. The others barely had time to comprehend what was happening before Setsuna continued with her game blasting apart chunks of the enemy bodies in the process and leaving holes in the building behind them while the insides were painted with their blood. An unprovoked attack on the country? A unjustified slaughter? Where were words like those when someone stormed into Nero's territory and murdered her friend? No Setsuna was here today because she was out for blood and she wasn't leaving without a lot more of it.

"Damn you!" Oh one of the dragons were still alive? How unexpected that was.

"You're still alive? Wow I guess you stupid lizards are stronger than you look." Setsuna plunged the tip of her spear into the thigh of the dragon man and twisted.

"RRRAAAGGGHHH!"

"Not smarter though, Considerably stupider in fact how unfortunate for you." Setsuna cruelly moved her spear tip around in the man's leg. How much of her was being influenced by the Spear of Wrath she at times wondered, and ultimately decided she didn't really care. "If you had played dead you could've waited for your opportunity to strike while I was busy with your comrades." Setsuna removed the spear from the confused Dragon man's body and pressed it's head up against the bodies of one of the dead dragon men. The one who was still alive watched in horror as Setsuna absorbed the man's body into her spear, which she then had automatically broken down into individual pieces and turn those into weapon forms for her spear.

"Bitch!" The Dragon growled prompting a spiteful stomp on his wounded leg. "RAGH! You turn our people into materials for your weapons! How dare you!"

"How is that different from what any other Hero, Legendary or Seven Star, does?" If Nero can be treated simply as a baggie of experience points that so happens to have a powerful weapon attached for someone to loot off of his body then the same holds true for anyone, especially the people who perpetuate that logic. "You people murdered my friend, if any of you think that all of you combined being slaughtered can make up for that then you are dead wrong!" Deciding that she had better people to kill Setsuna took the man's head with her spear before she moved on with her business. The Aototsu leader, or at least anyone who would've stood a chance against Nero hadn't shown up yet. "You aren't going to come out of there? Fine! I'll just knock the building down around you!" Setsuna continued to loose skill after skill into the building blowing off chunks of it as she did her damnedest to take the building shielding Nero's Murderers out. Eventually Setsuna earned the attention of the manor's tenants, or at least one of them, as a huge lung dragon flew out of the building in question.

"You dare to attack the home of the Aototsu's chief you impertinent mutt!?" The massive dragon shouted down at Setsuna a look of in-credulousness in her voice.

"I do! I do dare!" Setsuna snapped back as she checked the dragon's body for any signs of the claws from Nero. "One of you bastards murdered my friend! And I am not leaving here until I have their head! Now Piss off!" Setsuna shifted the spear's form over to the one she got from the ice vulture before she threw it at the dragon. The chunks of ice smashed against blue scales as Setsuna reclaimed her spear, it seems that the scales of this dragon were unusually tough, it didn't even lose out against the likes of the ones from her home land.

"Die you little brat!" The dragon's maw opened in a massive roar and loosed a stream of steaming hot water down at Setsuna with enough pressure to take flesh off of bone, if her stats weren't so unreasonably high that is. Setsuna was better prepared for the second steam blast, in part because the not unreasonably over confident dragon had closed the distance with her, but mostly because she wasn't trying to bait her anymore. Setsuna secretly hid the shifting of the spear over to her Dragon Slayer as she looked at the enemy before her.

"Hey you whore tell me do you fight as badly as you fuck?" That got her attention, and served to piss her off. Immediately the dragon spun around and fired off another steam breath at Setsuna this time at point black range. Setsuna used her spear to catch the blow, imbued it with the dragon slayer properties of her spear, and then threw it back at the dragon."Backlash Wave!"

"What!?" The dragons eyes went wide as her own attack was snatched out of the air, powered up and then thrown back at her. The blow tore off one of the dragon's arms causing her to scream in pain and confusion at her own lack of understanding precisely what the hell actually just happened.

"I'm not through with you yet!" Setsuna jumped and took off into the air like a rocket, the confused dragon soon turned to panic as the Hanyo approached her. The Dragon attempted to smack her out of the sky with her tail but Setsuna countered by twisting her body around, changing her direction with another Meteor thrust and was soon able to catch a hold of the tail and started to run up it.t

"Stay away from me!" The Dragon first tried to shake Setsuna off, would have sent her flying too if she hadn't stabbed the dragon slayer into the gap where two scales met each other and got it stuck there. The dragon woman took advantage of that, or at least tried her damnedest to, loosing several columns of steam breath at her to try and blow Setsuna away. Setsuna's response was to switch her spear over to the rope spear and jump off the the Aototsu before swinging up on the rope tarzan style as the jet streams of water slammed into the tail. Her next move already planned out Setsuna started to chant magic.

"I, the Hero of the Spear, call upon the origin of power." While Setsuna stated her chant Chunks of flesh were torn away as Setsuna's spear was dislodged, but the Aototsu was confident that she had at least managed to knock the mutt off, before she felt some thing tugging at the bits of flesh hanging from her shoulder.

"Why won't you die already!?" Fear and panic started to set in, she knew far better than most that the defence stat only applies to the blows applied to the skin, part of the reason why open wounds were so damning on the battlefield. A bacterial infection didn't give a damn about stats.

"Make my target rot from the tip of my blade! Zweite Decay!" A familiar miasma coated the tip of Setsuna's dragon slayer blade as she charged a meteor shot to be fired directly into this thing's heart.

"Oh hell no!" Fearfully the dragon transformed back into her human form just to try and get away from this insane woman who seemed to be intent on chasing her to the ends of the earth. Setsuna on the other hand went through all this trouble to put together this attack and it felt like a shame to let it go to waste.

"Meteor Thrust!" The rotting magics slammed into the Aototsu woman, enhanced by the presence of the Spiritual power in Meteor Thrust, latching onto the dragon woman's pre-existing wounds, the majority of them self inflicted, and made them fester.

"HHHYYYAAAHHH! WHAT ARE YOU!? WHAT THE BLEEDING HELLS ARE YOU!?" Setsuna pressed her arms and legs together as she sped up into a full blown free fall and closed the distance with her enemy and just as a additional layer of 'screw you' transformed into her full demon form before she caught up to the bloody lizard. Course she wasn't planning on eating the woman, while she was still alive that is, she learned the follies of that mistake first hand when she fought against the Tyrant dragon, monsters are a lot less durable from the inside of their throats, part of the reason why poisons are so effective. That said Setsuna just put approximately two tons of weight on as she grabbed hold of the dragon with her claws before they slammed into the ground, so yes she reasonably believed that hurt.

"Urgh...!" Setsuna groaned in pain as she stood back up using her spear to support her while she glowed with healing magic. "Oi you still alive?" Setsuna kicked the dragon woman with her foot and confirmed that she wasn't reacting, as a added precaution she brought down her spear and took the woman's head off, something that wouldn't be possible were she still alive. "That was... no. Not satisfying. Not even remotely satisfying." There was no way in hell this whore had beaten Nero, not only did she not have his claws but she also did not have the power to beat her, let alone him, and even if she had she understands that this means that she should have received a spike in power from the act based on what she knows about this 'levelling.' Instead Setsuna checked her level, 130. "Ugh, math." Setsuna took out her spear and started doing the number crunching using the weapon as a writing implement.

After Five levels she would be on par with the average level forty, after 30 the average level one hundred, but what about one hundred?

"Huu. We're the only ones who are suppose to be able to go beyond a hundred right? What kind of boost would that give the average person?" Setsuna decided she could investigate that later.

For now there were spears that needed unlocking and she knew just which one to start with. The copied spear was every bit as ostentatious and over the top as the one that the Pope's stand in was using to shoot at them way back when.

"Let's see what this does. Brionac!" With a shout Setsuna obliterated more of the mansion, getting the attention of the people inside at last. It was basically just a stronger version of Meteor Thrust with holy power mixed in. "Definitely a keeper, but back to the main priority." Setsuna watched as someone walked out of the half destroyed mansion.

"Nellisen, what are you doing...!?" The man was young, definitely in his twenties with medium length blonde hair that was being tied down by a red bandanna. He was wearing Blue jeans which were clearly a size too small based on the way they clung to his legs with a leather biker jacket, not a hint of armour on his person that Setsuna could see, but that didn't rule out that he had it sown into his armour like she did with her kimono. Most notable of all though was the look of gobsmacked horror he had on his face when he saw his companion's headless body. A look that shifted over to rage as his eyes landed on Setsuna. "You!" The newcomer snapped as a familiar set of claws appeared on his hand.

"I was thinking exactly the same thing!" Setsuna switched over to the Spear of Wrath as she locked eyes onto her enemy. 'THAT DOES NOT BELONG TO HIM!' If the notification that Setsuna received was any indication even her normally annoyingly uncooperative weapon agreed with her in her hatred of this man.

"Vaizin Claw!" The man produced a energy slash with the claws which Setsuna subsequently caught using the backlash wave technique and threw it back at him. Setsuna saw the injuries Nero's body received. The bastard didn't just kill him, he also toyed with him, so that is exactly what Setsuna would do, take his suffering, connect to two carriages and have them take off in opposite directions. "Stop moving! Vaizin claw!" The blonde fired off another of his one shot moves at Setsuna prompting her to dodge again. Was that all he knows how to do? Well Setsuna wasn't one to talk but at least she mixes in other skills into her favourite combo. "Vaizin Claw!" The man-child was becoming increasingly frustrated as the fight wore on, eventually he decided to try mixing up his favourite instant kill attack as he whipped out a trio of throwing daggers.

"What the-?"

"Air Strike Throw!" The blonde shouted that out loosing a trio of the daggers from his oft hand directly at Setsuna.

"What!?" A quick Meteor Thrust put a end to the attack though not it's implications. "And here Naofumi accused me of being a cheat..." A Hero, legendary or otherwise, should not be able to wield a weapon other than their assigned weapon, let alone a second legendary weapon!

"Oh you think I'm cheating now!" The daggers and the claws both changed shape, the claws a familiar demonic red pattern plastered over the claws, and the knives were changed form into something that more closely resembled feathers.

"Two cursed weapons?"

"Dark Burning Slash!" With the claws the Blonde started to slash at Setsuna. To be fair he gave the impression of practised movements, Setsuna wouldn't be surprised if he learned weapon play thoroughly. But at the end of the day that's exactly what it was: Play. What Setsuna knew on the other hand could best be summarised as the art of murder. Practised movements were predictable, people who learn how to fight on the front lines have their movements exposed to people who prefer to fight dirty. Weaknesses in her formation was exposed early on before her bad habits had the chance to settle in, she doubted this punk has been in a real fight in his entire life. "Control stab!" The cursed daggers were flicked at Setsuna. She didn't want to know what Control meant and so opted to smack them away from her using her spear before she found out. "Ragh!" The young man traded in his claws and knives for a equally sinister looking Axe and hammer combo, both clearly of the curse of wrath based on their black flames. Both heavy weapons, both meant to be wielded with two hands, both in one hand and predictable, neither of which the fool actually knew how to use which made his clumsy swings all the easier to vault over. Setsuna slammed her foot into the morons head hard enough to cave it in and send him flying. That wasn't nearly as significant though as what he did next, as Setsuna bore witness to him getting back up and the caved in portion of his head inflating back into place. No magic, no potions, no ability from the weapons, it just... did.

"Now I know you're cheating." Setsuna was getting increasingly curious about where all of these abilities were coming from, maybe she'd ask him about them after she chopped off all of his limbs and burnt the wounds with dark burning curse so that they wouldn't regenerate.

"Foolish Sinner! I sentence you to cast your screams unto the heavens that you worship!" The blonde stated holding the hammer at Setsuna accusingly. Setsuna recognised the chanting of a cursed skill and so took the liberty of putting in one of her own.

"I the Demon of the Spear Command the origin of power! Sever, damn and recombine the principles of this world!"

"Within the dragon's jaws born of my flesh..."

"Devour the flames of my wrath..."

"...become a offering to the gods as you howl in pain!"

"...and summon a dragon from the Depths of the Underworld!"

"Blutopher!"

"Sacrifice Dragon Twister!" The Blonde's body burst at the seams and his blood seeped into the ground, before immediately reappearing around Setsuna in a bear trap shaped mass of blood, dirt and stone. Setsuna blocked the closing jaws with her spear while a jet of black fire spewed out one side and set the whole thing on fire. A loud explosion detonated throwing both the blonde back into the mansion and sending Setsuna flying through the air, Setsuna was quickly caught by Yuki. The members of Setsuna's party was put on standby, if whoever was behind this really was strong enough to take on Nero then it was better they stay behind and not get in the cross fire. Now it seems that they'll have to lick their wounds while waiting for opportunity to get back at the bastard.

"Takt-Sama has been maimed! Quickly! Get him to the healers!" The various women who was inside of the mansion swarmed around the blonde's, Takt's body. Far from trying to save his life though, they rammed a knife through his heart, directly in front of a tank that had his clone inside of it. A few moments later the clone stirred to life letting out a pant, realising fully how close to death that he was just now. Actual proper death too, or at least that's what it felt like at least.

"We aren't leaving ShieldFrieden until we find her!"

Setsuna found herself eating some manner of monster that Keel and Rifana had hunted while she was busy busting up the Aototsu's little home base, that together with the barrel of water she was drinking served as a strong reminder of the blood draining spear.

"You shouldn't have confronted him by yourself." Rifana stated looking at Setsuna worriedly while she wrapped bandages around the burns she took.

"As oppose to confronting him with the five of you?" Setsuna asked looking at the pair suspiciously and the Three headed dogs who brought in another large animal for Setsuna to eat.

"We didn't join you just so that we could be protected." Rifana stated, her displeasure at the way they had been effectively side lined while Setsuna was the one fighting off Takt was clear.

"You were not being protected you were being held in reserve. Learn the difference!" Setsuna caught herself shouting before she forcibly calmed herself down and got down to business. "Blindly attacking a unknown enemy without a fall back plan is a recipe for disaster. If I needed to be rescued I required fresh people who hadn't been in a fight to cut their way through the enemy forces and rescue me."

"And now that you do know?" Rifana asked looking at Setsuna suspiciously.

"Now you're being protected, largely because I have to protect myself too." Setsuna stated making her opinion clear. "He took a blow to the head that should have crushed a normal person's skull but not only did he shrug it off but I saw what I kicked off grow back." Rifana and Keel had horrified looks on their faces, they knew first hand what kind of leg strength Setsuna had having been dragged along for the ride as she took one of her mile long hops through the sky. "In addition to Nero's claws he also had throwing daggers, an Axe and a Hammer."

"But Nero-san was one of the Seven Star Heroes!" Rifana had a horrified look on her face as if she had come across a horrified realisation. "And the Daggers could transform into new forms as well." Claws, Hammer, Axe, Projectiles...

"It would appear that he has the ability to steal the Legendary and Seven Star weapons. On top of that he had I'm going to bet at least two cursed series, maybe more. He tried to use wrath and one other on me when we were fighting." Dangerous. This person had such a huge number of unknown factors about him that confronting him would be suicidal. But at the same time... "Until I can say for certain that we can beat him with 100% certainly, we are not going to be able to confront him. But at the same time not fighting him is not acceptable." Setsuna was not going to let this man live any longer than she had to, Nero wouldn't rest easy until his murderer was dead.

"So what are we going to do?" Rifana asked looking dejected all of a sudden.

"We're going to make a weapon that doesn't loose out to one of the legendary weapons." Setsuna suddenly opened up her mouth wide and grabbed hold of one of her fangs and ripped it out grunting in pain in the process. "Alright you. You can make weapons out of random crap for me? Make one out of this." Thus Setsuna dropped the fang into her weapon's loot box.

Review Section:

RonaldM40196867: Oh I wouldn't know, they manage to take their depraved little experiments pretty far in the Web Novel. I'm more surprised from the thorough deconstruction that it creates in other Isekai series then this one in particular.

Amatsumi: Hengen Musou isn't anything to sneeze at either.

MarauderPrime12: Thank you for Saying so.

superpierce: Thank you for saying so.