Disclaimer: Black Clover is owned by Yūki Tabata, Studio Pierrot, and Shonen Jump.
Saga 29: Forest Part 5
Unknown Forest?, Spade Kingdom?, ?
Quickly emerging from the wash of solid gold, Dagda with the weakened Lugh tied around his back crawled out of the flood, spitting out a few pieces of yul that managed to get in his mouth. "... Gargh... peh. Damned bitch," he muttered as he looked back to his emaciated companion. "Oi, ye still alive?!"
The weakened Lugh moaned and groaned in response, still too weak to speak coherently.
"Gud... yer alright-" the half-Demon's sigh of relief was cut short by the malignant presence shooting itself out towards him from behind, forcing him to duck under Ishtar's ambushing lunge. Upon looking back up, he saw the lioness Demon slide back with her claws acting as a break against the hoard that she'd piled onto the forest's floor.
"You dodged," she commented. "That means you know that my [Gauge Magic] has rendered your [Counter Magic] utterly useless."
Dagda gritted his teeth as he pointed his [Fragarach] short sword at the Demon. "Try me."
Ishtar slightly smirks at his paradoxical remark. "... How are you even more shortsighted than Asmodeus-?"
With the mere mention of that horse's name, Dagda's cool head was immediately set ablaze with unrelenting fury as he swung his sword down towards her, the latter parrying the blow back with her claws.
"And even more short-tempered too," Ishtar commented as she automatically sharpened her claws with her own magic. "Face it, if you can't get past me, then you stand no chance against your father-"
"HE AIN'T ME FATHA!" the half-Demon roared as he struck back, with Ishtar grabbing Dagda's sword arm mid-swing. Upon being stopped, Dagda tried to deliver a kick to her face, only for her to dodge as she then hammers Dagda and Lugh back down into the gold pile, only for Dagda to use his own [Counter Magic] onto his own feet to bounce off of the gold, preventing any harm coming to his weakened friend while he himself staked himself into the floor with his feet rooted into the gold pile.
"Even at its weakest, you're still able to make your magic work," commented Ishtar as she then let go of Dagda before hopping away from the latter. "But crafty as you are, you're sorely lacking in killing power."
"Fek ye, yer de one riggin' me magic to be at its weakest point," Dagda pointed out as he briefly checked on Lugh.
"Hence proving my point," the lioness Demon pointed out as she adjusted her glasses. "Your magic makes you the ultimate sword and shield, but that's only in the context of the living world. My reputation as Hell's ultimate sword and shield vastly eclipses your renown. The only ones who were able to make me submit are the ones whose magic is beyond all forms of control, the ones whose limits are nonexistent, and the ones who makes the laws of reality and physics a complete joke on a whim. Everyone not in the aforementioned categories cannot so much as scratch me."
"So why 'aven't ye killed me yet?" taunted Dagda. "... Fur sumone callin' demselves 'Hell's Ultimate Sword 'nd Shield,' yer kinda not livin' up te de hype."
"If you inherited anything from Asmodeus, it's his mouth and durability," Ishtar remarked. "Initially, I've gauged the amount of effort that I need to put into killing you to be appropriate."
The malignant aura emitting from the lioness Demon intensifies into a shadowy vortex of quiet desire wanting the world's riches into a singularity.
"Allow me to reascertain my initial impression of you," she spoke in a composed manner, contrasting to the growing killing intent coming off of her. "Even while you're distracted protecting that corpse of a living being, you still refuse to die after so much as being flooded with cursed gold coins that I've flooded this whole segment of this forest with and your overall performance remaining unhindered despite the contributing physical and psychological burden. Conclusion, I need to try harder."
Ishtar then picks up a yul coin before flicking it towards Dagda with lethal velocity. The half-Demon then tries to use his [Fragarach] sword to at least use the coin's momentum to create distance between himself and the Demon, but just as he was about to parry the projectile, the flicked coin splits in three.
In place of Dagda being able to deflect one coin, the two other coins burrow themselves into his body as he was sent crashing across the golden pile.
"... Alright, it works as planned, now to apply the method into practice," confirmed the Demon as her forearms began to glow in a gold light. "[Gauge Enhancement Magic: Combo Dealer]."
In an instant, only kicking off a few glimmers of gold yul from her heels, Ishtar then disappears from Dagda's sight before showing herself up right in his face before drilling a gut-busting punch into his stomach, sending him flying through several trees before he can so much as vomit a single drop of blood.
However, the agonizing sensation that Dagda felt didn't end there. After that one punch, six more punches were then burrowed into his body, without having Ishtar herself to deliver them physically, and each one just as heavy and agonizing as the first, with the only thing that Dagda can do was to use his weakened [Counter Magic] to protect the equally-weakened Lugh as he can only bet on his half-Demon biology to weather his beating through the acres of woods that he was being smashed through.
Eventually, the travel stops as soon as Dagda lands on against the tree that didn't snap in two upon impact and the ground being made of dirt and roots rather than gold. He then checks on Lugh, who compared to the half-Demon, was only mildly banged up whereas Dagda was flayed and wounded all over after being rammed through several hundred meters of rough bark and timber.
"... Gud," he sighed in relief as his wounds began to heal on their own, "ye alright."
"Is it now really the time to worry about anyone but yourself?" Ishtar asked as she suddenly appeared before Dagda's face before delivering another multi-punch to his raised forearms, shattering it in several places at once through the multilayered composite barrage from her [Combo Dealer] enhancement. "... Even after everything, you still prioritize others over yourself? Why?"
"... Ye wouldn't know," snarled Dagda as his shattered arms healed on their own as his feet held fast onto the earth. "... Cuz yer a Demon... so why bother askin'?"
"I'm a venture capitalist," she answered bluntly as she kept punching with her combos. "Part of my job is to seek new and undiscovered things to squeeze a profit out of it. So antithetical as it is, I'm always trying to figure out what drives people to do these monumentally stupid acts for even stupider reasons so that I can find a way to benefit from it. After all, time is money, and if I am stuck with morons, I might as well find a ludicrous way to benefit from it."
Dagda then lashes out his sword arm holding [Fragarach], to which Ishtar prepared to intercept it with her [Gauge Magic]-hardened forearms, only for Dagda to instead use the pommel of his Relic as he then concentrates his [Counter Magic] through the rounded tip, the cudgel then sending the Demon flying back into her golden stockpile in this astonishing reversal.
After all, despite the Demon's skin being practically invincible, it was still flexible, retaining said trait unless Ishtar wished to be stiff as a statue, so blunt weapons like a sword's pommel can still technically hurt her.
"... De fact dat ye call it 'stupid'," growled the half-Demon as he flipped his sword back around to its blade pointed towards Ishtar, "... means dat ye'll never understand."
Ishtar gets up, scattering a few hundred cursed yul coins that buried atop of her. "Impossible," she remarked. "A half-Demon like you understood, so I should be able to with enough effort-"
"ALL YE UNDERSTAND IS MONEY!" Dagda roared out. "YE TAKE LITERALLY EVERYTHIN' AND PLACE DEM INTO NUMBAS AND CHARTS!"
"Am I wrong though?" the Demon remarked dispassionately as several disturbed [Jabberwocky] monsters surrounded her, only for her to use her [Gauge Magic] to reduce their hydrogen-oxygen compounds within their wooden bodies to a threshold that causes them to wither away before even one of their maws could make an attempt to snap on her. "Since time immemorial, life as a whole was nothing more than a convoluted numbers game. The strong devour the weak, the many overwhelm the few, the hardiest outlast the soft, and just as rain extinguishes fire, fire devours the earth, the earth stands stalwart against the winds, and the winds stir up the waters, there has always been a clear divide on who goes and who stays. I did everything I can to stay ahead of the curve, and that hasn't changed even after I became a Demon. With that said, why are you burdening yourself with that weakling? Why the self-sabotage?!"
Dagda smirks. "... Cuz it's me choice te live not as a monster like ye."
Ishtar's eyes narrowed at his remark, an unpleasant and rotten feeling welling up into her bosom. "...Then allow me to unburden you."
The Demon then flicks another gold coin past Dagda before flicking another, causing the latter to ricochet off of the former, speeding toward Lugh tied onto Dagda's back.
The half-Demon then immediately turns around to parry the coin, only for him to realize too late that Ishtar had driven her claw through Lugh's chest and out of Dagda's, with the latter now seeing his own heart being held in the Demoness's claws.
"All that, for naught," the lioness then pulls out her hand from the two before crushing Dagda's heart into a ball of meat. "... So Dagda, how does it feel to be weak?"
The half-Demon's murderous intent erupts out of him as Dagda then undoes the shirt that held Lugh on his back, the hole breached into the back of his upper torso closing up by itself. He then turns back to face Ishtar himself, his face now bearing black, claw-like marking, and the sclera of his eyes now pitch-black.
"You're dead."
Ishtar then uses her [Gauge Magic] onto Dagda to lower all of his parameters to their lowest, but even still, aa punch from his enraged state was enough to crumple her hardened skin, bruise the muscles underneath it, and shatter the bones around the flesh before the compound impact then sends her flying through the towering trees surrounding them.
Even as the Demon was sent flying, the maddened Dagda then gave pursuit to the flying Ishtar, breaking through the several trees of his own in order to reach her, his [Fragarach]'s blade ripping through the dormant [Jabberwocky] monsters that were inside the trees that he'd torn through as he edged closer towards the fleeting Ishtar.
"Now you've finally liberated yourself," commented Ishtar as she then applied her [Gauge Magic] to several released [Jabberwocky] monsters and forcibly evolved them into [Níðhöggr], their bark scales becoming more serrated and thicker, looking more akin to slithering boring drills than wooden serpents. "Let me measure your capabilities!"
The evolved [Jabberwocky] were all cut down in an instant, seemingly by Dagda's killing intent alone. Ishtar tried to ascertain this anomaly, only for her to be interrupted before being repelled by an unknown force.
Something is blocking me, the Demoness instinctively smirked in anticipation of studying this maddened half-Demon while her arms finished healing on their own. It's definitely not [Counter Magic], given that I practically diluted it to its weakest threshold. No, it's something else entirely! Something that's actively rejecting all of my advances upon that halfling after he was pushed past a certain mental threshold. A latent power perhaps?
The Demoness's curiosity begins to override her better judgement. "It seems that I have a constant bad habit of underestimating you!" she cackled in excitement as she then used her [Gauge Magic] to forcibly increase the number of a [Jabberwocky]'s heads, transforming it into a facsimile of a long-extinct [Hydra]. "It is quite fortuitous to find such a diamond in the rough!"
Dagda remains silent as his quiet madness refuses to cede before he then proceeds to spine-rip all nine of the [Hydra]'s heads in an instant, not giving it a chance to fight back before he made his way towards the Demoness.
Ishtar smirked in glee, not even remotely afraid. "No profit comes without a degree of risk!"
Once more, she then uses her [Gauge Magic] onto Dagda again, but as the latter pushed back, the former then takes the moment to analyze this anomalous magic coming from him.
"Ah, now I see what the deal is!" the lioness then stepped back before locking arms against Dagda, only for her to be repelled when she tries to sneak in a blow. "And here I thought I'm fighting against a fellow sword and shield, but it turns out my opponent is actually wielding two kinds of shields."
From Ishtar's eyes, Dagda's [Counter Magic] emitted a multi-directional aura similar to an octopus's feelers that each react according to the attack that they're in contact with. But now, her eyes now pick up a differently-shaped aura. A solid back sphere that was pitch enough to block all light from touching him, only wisps of gaps that occasionally showed his eyes peeping through.
"An offshoot of Asmodeus's [Vector Magic], but specialized solely in the concept of rejection itself..." mused Ishtar. "... [Push Magic], isn't it-?"
The unseen force pushes back Ishtar, her eyes picking up on the sphere momentarily expanding before retracting back to its default size and shape.
"And fluid too, less solid and more akin to liquid..." commented the Demoness before she then took out the alien-looking Demon baby that she picked up at the Heart Kingdom's outskirts. "Whereas [Counter Magic] balances offense and defense for manual input-redirection as an all-rounder utility, [Push Magic] is purely autonomous and reactive, only responding to any forms of whatever the user subconsciously recognizes as an 'attack'."
This time, Dagda remains still, confirming Ishtar's theory that Dagda's secondary [Push Magic] would only work if Ishtar pushed the halfling's buttons.
"Still, no better time then now for you to prove your mettle than now, my investment," grinned Ishtar as she then tossed the Demon baby towards the maddened Dagda.
The unseen force then pulsed outwards, bringing ruin unto whatever that touched its reach. Upon contact, the baby then lets out an eldritch cry that echoed throughout the woods that counteracted against the unknown [Push Magic]'s repellant force. As the baby cried even more, its features began to slowly shift to adapt against this chthonic power, now growing aerodynamic scales that was both durable in make and sublime in luster, both of which allowed the flow of [Push Magic]'s aura of rejection to be wedged apart like a boat's shape piercing through the waves. This formed a gap that allowed Ishtar to approach the halfling for a closer observation
As the baby continued adapting against the maddened Dagda's malicious force that came without end, Ishtar remained unflappably calm while she observed this out of control magic coming out of the latter.
Hm, now I understand, she thought as she continued with her observations. [Counter Magic] falls under the "Conceptual" category of magical attributes, its numeric values being determined on how much the user can repel back a colliding force, creating a force of disparity that allows Dagda to use a defensive magic as an offensive tool when called for. [Push Magic] on the other hand is more akin to "Abnormal" category, where said attribute cannot be defined by the laws of physics and are to be the magic of the old gods and the divine itself. Mine unfortunately falls under the former category, only exploiting all logic revolving around the concept of numbers, and so does Asmodeus's, only on the concept of directions.
Ishtar had already figured it out that Dagda was a half-Dwarf due to his ability to carry two different attributes (something that is a bit of a racial trait of theirs and why they managed to form an empire before Year 666's Armageddon), and mentally concluded that Dagda's [Counter Magic] was his dwarven gift whereas his [Push Magic] was something that he got from his horndog of a daddy.
Having seen enough, Ishtar then grabs the baby before applying her own [Gauge Magic] onto it to capitalize on its new growth, transforming its whole body to become akin to a modest-looking shield with a reflective sheen. "... Oh my," she grinned, "you copied his [Push Magic], didn't you?"
Dagda's [Push Magic] collided against the baby's own [Push Magic], allowing Ishtar to plow her way through before coming face to face with the unleashed Demon.
"It was fun, but it's time I cash you out," Ishtar then wound back a punch. "[Gauge Enhancement Magic: Combo Dealer-Thousandfold]!"
This time, upon Dagda receiving a punch to his gut again, but this time, her single punch now packing a force of a thousand punches of her own strength, now sending Dagda through numerous tower-sized trees as each collision either uprooted or broke through one after another until he was sent flying out of the canopy and towards the skies beyond.
She looks up to spot a faint glimmer of sunlight break through right before the breached canopy of the trees closed it back shut. "... How much time has passed since I came in-?"
But just before she could think about her sense of time, a yellow shaft sped towards her before Ishtar blocked it with her hardened forearms. Even after successfully blocking it, the marigold spear floated on its own before it resumed its assault, spinning and twirling itself around as if it were being wielded by an invisible spearman, forcing her to use the baby's shield form to repel the spear back to where it came from.
"... A little too late to save your companion," snarked Ishtar as she spotted the cherubic-looking young male riding atop of a floating stuffed animal resembling a dog as the yellow spear returned to his orbit.
The boy smiles. "I'm not too worried."
Then suddenly, it then felt as if Ishtar was now standing atop of a blazing sun. Looking towards her left, she then saw a muscular strongman wearing suspenders carrying the near-dead Dagda over his shoulder. It was Lugh, now fully restored to his prime after Dagda's flight through the trees had exposed him to natural sunlight, his [Solar Magic] now fully revitalized, as evident by the hole bored through his chest being healed over, even going far the puncture scar being glossed over by the default pigmentation.
Before Ishtar could panic, she then gleans at what was fueling that weakling to suddenly become jacked, but just before she could come up with an answer, a red spear pierces her rib, right from where she left her guard open, causing her to bleed profusely as her natural regenerative properties failed to act upon itself.
"My Relic, [Gae Dearg], is immune to all outside magic interfering with it save for my own," the boy then snaps his fingers to reveal the same yellow spear that had attacked her prior being overlaid on top of the former. "My other Relic, [Gae Buidhe], contains a special poison that completely shuts down a body's natural regenerative functions on where it had struck, magic or not. You fucked with one of us, so now, you answer to all of us."
Ishtar snarls as she then clutched onto her bleeding side, using her [Gauge Magic] to minimize the rate of amount of blood lost to that she's losing to that of a small paper cut, but still leaving her open with an open weak spot that she cannot allow to be exploited by the enemy. "... We'll reconvene later."
"Running away, you are not," Lugh's magic then sets his surroundings ablaze as he then manifested a grimoire made out of pure fire as the Demon fled elsewhere. "[Solar Magic: Gae Assail]."
The flaming grimoire then transforms into a burning spear with an eagle-shaped head before it was launched towards the fleeing Demon like a missile. Even with the Demon baby's newly acquired [Push Magic] the blowback from the solar flame's explosion was enough to send her and the baby flying away towards parts unknown, leaving only with the scorched earth that left behind in its wake.
As soon as the spell peters out, Lugh returns to his emaciated state prior. Although fully healed, he was now no longer in a condition to be in any fights until he was exposed to natural daylight again. "... Well now," he nervously chuckled, "you're doing well, Cernunnos."
"Likewise, Lugh," the boy then faced Dagda, still recovering from his injuries. "Hey boss, you still alive-?"
Cernunnos was then suddenly punched in the face as he was then sent flying into another tree. "... Still alive te kick yer arse, ye bastard."
"Oh come on, boss!" Cernunnos exclaimed as he got up as he snorted with his bleeding nose. "You know that I ain't got a Highlander's immortality like Lugh!"
"Don't remind me," grimaced Lugh as he recalled the time where he drank what he was convinced that it was the woman in white's own urine that effectively made him an immortal warrior. The price was not worth it. "... That aside, how long have you been awake?"
"For a good while," confirmed Cernunnos. "All by my lonesome until I came across a pile of cursed gold coins scattered all over the place."
Dagda then shakes off his fatigue before heading off. "... Alrite, let's go," he remarked as he sheathed his [Fragarach]. "De others are lookin' for us. Best not to keep dem waitin'."
The three then traversed past the now-regenerating woods that was once littered with burnt wood and cursed gold coins, both of which are now slowly being buried as the forest itself patched itself back together.
"... So, what happened before I got here?" asked Cernunnos, floating behind the other two. "I mean, aside from the pile of gold that would make any mercantilist jizz their pants in pure elation, I felt an absolutely hellish sense of dread that I'd never felt in my lifetime."
"... Me bad," Dagda apologized. "... I kinda lost it back dere... dat bitch knew de one dat..."
The same dark aura begins leaking out again upon the mere reminiscence of that bastard who's murdered so many during Year 666's Armageddon for the sake of sating his loins.
"... You don't have to force yourself," Cernunnos reassured. "... At least, now you don't have to deal with it alone, at least."
The half-Demon nodded in response. "... Thanks," he replied as he looked towards Lugh. "... Though legit, I thought ye were goin' te die after I saw ye like dat, all skin 'nd bones with de lack of sunlight and all dat."
"It is exceedingly painful," Lugh remarked as he held up his trousers now too big for him, the suspenders. "... Imagine being a corpse while retaining consciousness. Even the undead have more freedom to move. That was me, for about five minutes."
"Heh, gud te know dat me gettin' me arse kicked saved yer arse," Dagda smirked back. "... Seriously though, de fek was up 'er [Gauge Magic]? Is me [Counter Magic] dat predictable?"
"You beat the crap out all of us despite that, repeatedly," chuckled Cernunnos as he and Lugh recalled the times when they first joined and tried to usurp him, only to fail repeatedly until giving up and remaining as Dagda's subordinates. "... I guess that just means we just have to get stronger."
"Wat do ye know? Ulster's tendencies being rite for once," all three of them then share a chuckle before stopping as they continued their trek through the endless woods. "... I miss me shirt."
"Before you ask, no, I am not going topless in solidarity," Cernunnos pointed out. "... Don't even have a single pec to show off."
"Yeh, 'nd dat yer whole 'half-elf, half-dwarf' claim dat ye said te de Clover Kingdom folk is bullshite," Dagda pointed out. "... Dat said, does dis place feel anythin' te ye?"
Cernunnos shook his head. "Feels like this place has been trying to eat me alive since I woke up."
"Like all of us are," Lugh nodded. "... I can now understand why you're so anxious, Dagda."
The three continue walking until coming across a clearing with an especially-giant tree roughly a size of a small castle sprouting at the end. Trapped inside its winding trunks and brambles was none other than their resident Jotun, now fully-giant sized and lacking in clothing.
"DANU!" Dagda then ran up towards her as he drew his sword. "Hold on! I'll get ye out-!"
From above, a cascade of pinecones the size of grain silos fell onto and around Dagda before they all exploded. The half-Demon was repelled but unharmed, the latter due to his [Counter Magic] shielding him from the flames.
"Shit! Another one?!" Cernunnos then transformed his stuffed animals into his [Gae Dearg] and [Gae Buidhe] while the weakened Lugh stuck close to Dagda for his own protection.
The surrounding trees then began to slither and writhe until all gaps of the trees were then sealed shut, trapping them inside the clearing.
Just as the three were ascertaining their current situation, a vine-like worm then slithers into the unconscious Danu's ear, embedding itself into her brain as it then took control of her body.
"Danu?!" Dagda called out.
"I'm sorry, but you've got the wrong person," the [Leshy]'s voice overlaid with Danu's own spoke as the latter's eyes gleaned upon the three of them. "... A Demonborne, a human, and a Fae. Oh the news I have yet to deliver for my master."
"LET 'ER GO NOW!" ordered Dagda, brandishing his [Fragarach] menacingly.
The possessed Danu sighed in frustration. "... It's always the same with you people."
Suddenly, Danu's body began creaking in several places, first her neck snapped by itself before an array of deep-purple flower petals sprouted from it before enclosing themselves around the Jotun lass's head into a formation akin to that of an iris flower. Then from her shoulders down to her waist, several more dark-violet flower petals sprouted out, draping themselves over her body akin to a short dress. Following up on the prior, a pair of green leaves sprouted from her lower waist, flowing behind her like a pair of ribbon sashes. And from the ground emerged a pair of sprouts, both of which were then uprooted by the possessed Danu, revealing themselves to be a long sword with a blade made of magma, and a glaive made of earthen glacial ice.
"Unbelievable..." Lugh gasped in horror.
"What have you done to her?!" Cernunnos cried out, with Dagda furious beyond words to even utter a word.
"... [Chloris], the now-lost goddess of flowers, and a good friend of mine who was unjustly taken from this world," the [Leshy] spoke. "A minute figment of her was found in the ruins that once was the temple of the Arboreal Faithful, now paved over to make way for a hovel where accursed coven and their matriarch's experiments live. I'm merely using this girl as a vessel for a fallen friend. She should be honored-"
Dagda interrupts the lost god's speech with his fist smashing itself against the flower head.
"... Shut de fek up 'nd fite me, ye blowhard."
Elsewhere in the Same Woods (Probably)...
Makarov walked in front of the group, with Cu Chulainn, Mudo, Salim, Jericho, David, Dorothy, Letoile, Cissonius, and Bizon all walking behind him in a row. Their trek began as soon as their bonfire had died out on its own, and despite none of them having slept a single wink, none of them felt even the slightest physical fatigue, something that wasn't lost to the Clover Kingdom natives accompanying the Spade Kingdom's natives on their journey through these alien-feeling woods.
... If anything, their mental sense of dread of this forest utterly fucking with their senses, whole "feeling like pieces of meat being digested inside a monster's gut"-sensation getting worse by the minute.
"... Shouldn't we've run into some sort of monster by now?" asked Salim.
"Not quite," Mudo answered. "I've done a little mental math, and the likelihood of us running into [Treants] is about 47% average. So far, we're just lucky to be in that 53% check up to this point."
"So everything up to this point has been pure luck," chuckled David. "... Why do I feel attacked?"
"Eh, dun't git yer panties in a bunch," Cu pointed out. "Life is just like dat. Ye never know wat's gonna come next. But dat's de thrill."
"Kind of like our current alliance," sighed Jericho. "No offense."
"Eh, nun taken," the wild man shrugged. "... But really though, wat does peace feel like?"
"Uh, the fact that there's nothing like something blowing up at random or someone being horrifically murdered out there every five minutes?" David remarked. "Like being able to go fishing or gambling after a hard day of honest work, not having to worry about food, and being able to come back home with a roof under your head. Peace kinda allows a person to, you know, not have their heartbeats go above a lethal threshold every single day, something you guys are practically addicted to."
"But does dat kind of peace... does dat go fur literally everyone?" asked Cu.
David looked away, with him being painfully aware of the truth. "... Not really," he answered grimly. "I mean, a bit of a hot take, but I think the reason why no one in Clover Kingdom's starving right now is that there's more food than people after the Rain of Steel decimated our population. Before that, about a dozen or so villages and small towns are pretty much the local lords' piggy banks to the point where the people living there do nothing but work and barely eat."
"And that's not getting into how toxic the noble culture can get,"" Jericho grimaced as he glanced at Salim. "... I don't know, but why do I stomach you compared to last I saw you, I had to actively hold back the urge to murder you on the spot."
"Maybe losing my virginity to a gaggle of snake-women did something to me," the [Lightning Magic] user pointed out. "... Also, right back at you, jackass. I don't want to fry you on the spot anymore."
"Not like yer gud at dat anyway..." Cissonius rolled his eyes.
"Eh, dat's life," Cu shrugged. "De only thin' dat stays de same is dat dere's gonna be people getting fucked over at random. Ulster doesn't have peace, so in a way, I guess we're not complaining."
"... So what does that feel like?" asked Dorothy. "A life where there's no such thing as guaranteed peace?"
"A few thin's really," Cu then threw up his [Gae Bolg] towards above his head before grabbing the witch by her robes and dragging her towards himself, right before a staked simian-looking [Treant] fell from high up and towards its death. "... One thin, ye kinda learn how to detect fur threats hidden in plain sight 'nd be just as quick if not quicka den yer enemies."
Everyone then looks up to spot numerous pairs of eyes shining through the dim canopy's heights as they all jumped down to reveal themselves as more primate-like [Treants].
"Battle positions!" Makarov ordered as he then drew his [Chernobog] while everyone else did the same with their Relics or grimoires.
As the group dealt with their ambush, Cu continued talking with Dorothy, constantly maneuvering around the sprawl of enemies while seamlessly butchering them with his thorny shaft and bare hands in a macabre fusion of ballroom dancing and fighting off multiple enemies at once, demonstrating a perfect fusion grace and barbarity throughout the whole ordeal.
"Everyone's out to kill ye or fek ye, or both," the wild man remarked as he kept Dorothy close as his "dance partner" while swinging his [Gae Bolg] by holding the blade between his toes. "But 'ere's the fun part, no one's puttin' up airs of being decent people or sumthin' like dat. Everyone 'ere's honest and blunt, and we fight te not only survive the land that we're stuck in, but also te git stronga for our sakes."
"I doubt being able switch from friendly to murderous on the fly counts as anything honest," Dorothy pointed out as she held onto her hat while Cu then tripped over a [Treant] towards Letoile's direction to be slain by her spells. "Without trust, there's no such thing as honesty!"
"Eh, ye gunna 'ave to wing it with de honesty. When an Ulsterian wants te be friends with ye and wants ye fur supper, he means every word of it," Cu shrugged as he then threw Dorothy into the air before he then grabbed a [Treant] from behind and suplexed the monster's head into the ground and catching the witch during her descent, with both Jericho and Cissonius finishing it off as the monster tried to get up. "See? Like dat. But apply dat te literally everything going on with yer life."
"Argh, you guys are insane, but that's underselling it!" Dorothy remarked as she then found herself slouched over Cu's shoulder, spotting Bizon rip off a [Treant]'s leg before beating it to death with it while his [Labrys] was lodged into another [Treant]'s head. "You're not living a lot of room for people who might not be as capable!"
"Well, I can only vouch fur two thin's," Cu remarked as he then kicked his crimson spear towards a [Treant] chasing down Mudo after her [Dark Curse Magic] failed to kill a single one, "either they die quickly enough te not suffer, or dey find a way te grow strong by any means. Nuthin' 'ere is illegal except pissin' off de wrong person or Elderbeast, so everythin's permitted if it means getting stronga! Welcome te Ulster! Where nuthin's impossible as long as ye make it possible through yer bare hands!"
In Dorothy's mind, the mere thought of seeing a flight of Clover Kingdom's peasants running towards the wildlands of Ulster and its survivors from the crucible coming back as Captain-level mages kinda terrified her on an ethical basis. In her mind, just because someone can do it or something can be possible, doesn't make it that said course of action should be acted upon. The way Cu was saying these words with the innocence of a child made Dorothy doubt that there are any humans among Ulsterians.
There was no distinction between them and Wilderbeasts. The more Dorothy saw the [Treants] slaughtered in droves, even the bookish-looking Mudo mounting one of them before stabbing the tree monster to death with her ramshackle knife like a feral predator of the jungle, the less she could make out who was who.
"... Ye know, it's okay te not understand," Cu remarked as soon as he then kicked his [Gae Bolg] into the last [Treant], ending the ambush as he then gently let down Dorothy from his shoulder. "I mean, people dun't understand each other fully 'nd dey're gittin' along just fine, rite?"
"I mean, I guess you don't have open yourself fully to be good friends..." Dorothy remarked, "but I think as a Magic Knight, my main concern is that you Ulsterians might turn on us if you think fighting us counts for a good time."
"If you're worried that the Ulsterians will turncoat to the Demons, then fear not," Makarov remarked. "For context, their definition of Contractor literally boils down to 'summon a Demon or Devil, then beat it up, and keep beating it up until they're abused into servitude'."
"... That's... kinda even more horrifying than what Captain Dorothy brought up," Salim nervously commented.
"How is that even possible?" asked Jericho. "If the Ulsterians are that strong, then why are they incentivized to practice the dark arts?"
"Apparently, according to the testimony of a few Ulsterian Contractors, a few were on drugs, a few were drunk, and the rest did it to see what would happen," Mudo explained. "I think there was that one time where one Ulsterian who only became a Contractor just because he wanted to fight a Demon. The pair ended up killing each other after a single night."
Everyone then looked towards Cu, to which he nodded in confirmation. "I saw de whole thin' meself," he stated. "It was awesome."
"And you all imply that our nobles have issues," sighed Letoile. "At least we aren't known to summon denizens of Hell for fun."
"I mean, aside from a few Demons that grow a big enough pair to just leave, usually, the Contractors that end up on our kill list are the ones that get too big for their britches," Bizon pointed out. "That concern is where we come in. We'll serve as military police and provide training for said operations until the Clover Kingdom can run their domestic operations on their own."
"Is that your saying of 'get on our level and then we'll talk'?" David pointed out.
"Frankly, yes," Mudo nodded. "Peace is ideal and all, but if it goes on for too long, then the resulting stagnation will breed corruption among the ruling classes. I mean, the Zogratis Clan's definition of 'peace' when Libratium was their personal duchy was them treating the populace as their playthings. As you can tell, revolution was inevitable. Although logically, all civilizations go through a 'reset phase' after a prolonged state of calm. From our collective personal experience, the chaos keeps the elements of stagnation down enough to prevent a state of lull that would keep us on our toes."
"... Man you guys practically mastered the art of microaggression down to a science," Salim remarked.
"Just stating the obvious," Bizon pointed out. "Although to be fair, we're not exactly perfect by your standards. I mean, Avalon takes care of the poor and makes sure that literally no one's left destitute, but honestly, after hearing that you guys can sleep on soft bedding and the fact that there's actual farmland... forgive for feeling a bit envious, sinful as it is."
"Such smalls comforts are nonexistent in Avalon," Makarov commented. "Not even the Knights of the Round are eating any better than a commoner. And the only thing that's keeping us altogether is our constant anti-Demon propaganda and ignorance of the outside world, although the latter might be the reason why some of our Thaumaturges go rouge and form Lost Legions."
"And as much as Libratium now is better than when the Zogratis Clan were running roughshod with it, even I have to admit that the constant factor of [Chimera]s going on a rampage through the streets combined with so much bureaucratic paperwork is a bit of a pet peeve of mine," Mudo confessed with an embarrassed smile. "Seriously, just to have my room at the dorm reinforced, I had to go through a whole day's worth of paperwork just to get the retrofits installed! At least our Dragon-taught bureaucrats keep track of every single form signed and organized down to the nanosecond, so we managed to make that work."
Cu chuckles before sharing his own pet peeve. "Yeah, 'nd dere's de fact dat as much me boys are badasses, dere are a few idjits dat stand out like a leaf of lettuce in a cannibal buffet."
"Oh really?" Letoile remarked cattily. "Define what counts as moronic amongst you people of Ulster."
"Well, dere's dat one time where sum schmuck managed to find a tree growin' in the middle of Ulster of all places, and decided te take it te 'is tribesmen," Cu explained. "Upon arrivin', he den declared dat he's gonna eat de tree te prove dat he's a Highlander, an immortal badass blessed by de old gods te be der champions."
"... Eating a tree?" David gawked. "To prove that he's an immortal? I'm losing brain cells just thinkin' about it."
"Nah, dat's not de part dat makes 'im an idjit," Cu pointed out. "He died after chokin' on de last piece, 'is body at least made decent campfire, 'nd none of 'is tribesmen ate 'im lest dey inherited his dumbarse tendencies."
Everyone sans Cu visibly cringed at the ending of that anecdote.
"... 'Nd he wasn't even drunk or on sumthin'?" asked Cissonius, to which the wild man nodded. "... Ye gods, dat bastard's a daft cunt."
"... So common median of idiocy in your standards are the furthest fringes of violations of common sense," Letoile shuddered. "... Thank you for letting us know that suicidal bloodlust is like breathing to you folks."
"Eh, happy te be 'ere," Cu shrugged. "Never got te fite a Demon meself 'nd after I 'eard dat Libratium went under a big Demon attack, now I wanna piece."
Jericho sighs in frustration. "... I swear to Sephira, it's not weird why my mother left."
"Worry about the future after we get out," Makarov remarked as he sheathed his scythe back into his sheathe. "Let us move."
The group then proceed through the wealds, their continuous trek through the bumpy ground while everyone did their best to forget what they've talked about. They walked for what it felt like an indeterminable amount of time.
"... So uh, about yer FAMAS," Cu brought up, "... sorry about wreckin' it."
"It can't be helped," Mudo replied. "I doubt that the hangar wagon survived too. I'd sooner see my baby put down then let it continue to be misused by some has-been god."
Both share a nod as they continued walking, their little diversionary talk doing nothing to distract them from the creeping sense that there was something wrong with their chronological perception.
In fact, now it felt as if time no longer existed in the place they were in. They didn't feel the need to sleep, their hunger cycles were slowly being phased out of their minds/hunger itself no longer began to register in their minds, their senses were both being blurred and sharpened the longer they continued to traverse through this unknown of a forest, but despite the gradual losing of their grounded senses, none of them felt the need to go insane.
If anything, they felt as if they were becoming one with the forest itself. They just merely kept the privilege to move around freely. None of them dared bring it up despite said thought being in everyone's minds.
"... Are we sure we're going the right way?" asked Salim, to which everyone else gave him a stink-eye for it, causing him to shrink back and retract his statement. "... Sorry."
"Don't think, or even talk about it," Bizon remarked as he then grabbed Salim by his robes before dragging him closer to the Inquisitor. "We all, and already, know."
"I spot a clearing just up ahead," Makarov remarked, causing his subordinate to drop the penal Silver Eagle. "... There a familiar sense coming from it. Likely a survivor."
"Sounds like an ambush waitin' te happen," Cu pointed out. "... Count me in. But only fur de fightin'."
"That leaves us with the rescue operations then," Letoile stated as her magical compass then pointed its needle straight ahead. "... Am I starting to feel concerned that I'm only picking up one mana signature coming up ahead? One that's akin to ours and not a Spade Kingdom's mutant populace?"
"Good, you're learning," Mudo remarked. "All in favor getting this bullshit over with, say 'aye'."
"Aye," everyone unanimously raised their motions.
"Motion received, let's kick some ass," Mudo nodded as she then drew her knife.
The group then approaches their next clearing and find Kirsch suspended above their heads by the binding around his arms.
"Kirsch!" Dorothy cried out as she then tried to jump up towards him, only for a [Jabberwocky] to come flying out from the side and devour Kirsch whole before she could reach him. "NO!"
"SHITE!" Cissonius cursed as everyone got into positions. "I KNEW HE WAS A BAIT!"
"Oh you miserable, unthinking boobs," taunted the [Leshy]'s voice from above as the wooden serpent slithered around them from outside of the clearing. "The forest is me, so do you think that your little parlor tricks would catch me off guard twice in a row? I'm already dealing with a lion's share of intruders at several other points, so I had time to... adapt my methodologies."
Cu then threw his [Gae Bolg] towards the serpent's maw to kill it from the inside, only for the Demonic parasite to bounce off of its bark-like hide. "Fek me. Guess de same shite ain't gunna work."
Both Inquisitors growled in frustration as everyone readied themselves for another boss fight. "... Can't stay down, can't you?"
"Oh I'm far from finished," reassured the forest god as the [Jabberwocky] then slithered up towards one of the trees around them, keeping overwatch from an elevated point. "Watch."
From an unseen position around the group, the [Leshy]'s physical form then latches itself into the [Jabberwocky], beginning its transformation into a deadlier form.
The slithering serpent then first grew a pair of sharp-clawed forelimbs and hindlimbs, turning the serpent into a quadruped [Drake]-like creature with a serpentine body as base. Then its head began growing a crown of petal-like fins that glowed a bright pinkish-red hue in tandem with its flat and rounded head turning more streamlined and canine and feline-like. And finally, between its scales then grew patches of dark-violet fur, each frolic size a size of a pine needle now all emitting small wisps of pinkish-blue colored flames that were left behind as a trail of cherry blossom-like embers every time the transforming beast had moved from tree to tree as now the dark-brown scales began to turn birch-white.
As its transformation then finished, the modified creature then leapt down from the trunks that it coiled itself around before landing before the gathered group, letting out a shrill roar that buffeted a howling gust towards their faces.
"Behold [Tefnut], the Ra-Atum Empire of Dama's goddess of nature's prosperity," spoke [Leshy]. "Upon the Empire's collapse, their entire Pantheon went on a mass exodus in order to preserve their names lest their existences were condemned to oblivion. Not everyone made it, including her. So allow my friend to take her rage out onto you nonbelievers."
Jericho was more annoyed then intimidated, something that he's greatly concerned about. "... Seriously, how many more are out there?!"
"Given dat we're nowhere near de exit, I'd say as much de green bastard feels like it," Cissonius pointed out.
"Forget what I said," the [Platinum Magic] user then equipped his [Stardust Knuckles] around his arms as everyone prepared themselves for another fight that served to slow them down.
Somewhere Else in this Huge-Ass Forest...
"Ow..." grimaced Corrin as she rubbed the back of her throbbing head.
"Suck it up," Ogmios scoffed.
"Well excuse me for not being born in Ulster!" Corrin snapped before turning towards the other, non-Ulsterian Spade Kingdom residents (and Aengus). "... Seriously, how are you guys so hardy when I'm the only one who's actively hurting around here?!"
"I got beat up a lot when I was a kid," Zenon remarked.
"I never think about it," Vanica shrugged.
"I spent my teens in Ulster as a Dungeon canary and sherpa, so that might be something," Rinaldo pointed out. "... But hey, one ex-Clover Kingdom to a Clover Kingdom, you're not doing too badly adjusting."
"I don't remember how I got where I am now save for a few flashes," Roland spoke.
"And the weirdest of all, Aengus has this weird-ass power," as Moccus as his back was mounted by the white-haired girl herself. "You see, she kinda has the ability to shut off a person's bloodlust and negative emotions whenever she's nearby. But unfortunately, it works on maladjusted people or regular beasties, and given Corrin has sanity, she's stuck on her own."
Corrin then looked back towards Ogmios and Brigid to see if the pig's words held any water.
"... Yes, I am indeed sane," Ogmios stuck a flamboyant pose with a blank expression. "All that I have said are the acceptance of Ulster being a place where the weak die and the strong might survive and my years being here."
"Wait, you said you were an outsider, right?" Corrin pointed out. "... Where were you from originally?"
The nonplussed young man then brushed aside his magenta hair before answering. "... Got wiped off the map. Literally."
"I'm sorry," she apologized. "... No wonder why you're an asshole."
"Don't be, never liked that place," he shrugged. "Brigid was the one who found me and convinced boss to let me stay."
"He wasn't always so phlegmatic," Brigid remarked. "Earlier, he was a spiteful, resentful kind of a bugger. Partially teenage angst, but one doesn't approach Ulster just because they have a disagreement with their parents."
"Yeah..." Patry/Captain Licht chuckled as he recalled he and his mother being chased out of their father's home and into the Forsaken Realm, "... I guess so-"
Wait a minute, the elf thought as he then recalled that memory. These aren't my memories.
He tried to think again, of all the times where he was with other elves-
... Where are the other elves? he thought as he can't find the related memories, nor can he can find the memories where his "mother" was an elf like him. What's happening?! Why are these memories in my head?! Whose memories are those?!
"... Captain Licht?" Corrin approached the swaying Golden Dawn Captain. "... You alright? You're looking kinda pale."
I have to tell the truth, he thought as he was being carried over by the girl's shoulder. I might be going crazy anyway.
Reluctantly, he then tells everyone the truth. "... Everyone, the truth is I'm not Captain Licht," he spoke. "My real name is Patry, just an elf who barely entered in his teens."
Zenon and Vanica looked at each other, knowing that they were both young adults trapped in children's bodies. "... He one of us?"
"All the accomplishments that I achieved, from being the first elf Magic Knight in Clover Kingdom to me winning numerous battles against the Diamond Kingdom and Spade Kingdom aggressors, are not my accomplishments," he continued to share, pouring out his heart's content of built of stress to the others. "They are in fact, someone else's. This body, this robe, and everything save for this grimoire, is not mine! I am just a stray soul wandered into someone else's body and this forest is putting me into a position where I am this body's original inhabitant at the expense of the actual original owner! My memories are contradictory, my feelings are all over the place, and all of you calling me 'Captain Licht' when I know someone else who went by the name 'Licht' is kinda freaking me out!"
Ogmios then opts to cut the middleman and read his mind with his [Memory Magic]. "... Nothing wrong there," he remarked. "All of his memories are flowing coherently from point A to point B smoothly. It ain't like Roland's, whose mind is basically a infinite sea of black void sprinkled with a few islands that are his memories. Point is, nothing's wrong. It's just neurosis."
"... That can't be," Captain Licht spoke. "... I know, these aren't my memories!"
"We take a break if you want Captain," Corrin pointed out, her words causing a surge of pain welling in his chest. "This place isn't doing any of us favors."
"Come on Licht," Roland spoke, causing another surge within him. "Just a bit longer and we should be out."
"Licht."
"Captain Licht."
"Licht."
"Licht."
"Captain Licht-"
He then lets out a screech as he finally snapped. "WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE?! WHO AM I?! GET AWAY! GET AWAY FROM ME!"
"Wait, Captain, please, calm down-!"
"DON'T CALL ME THAT!" [CENSORED] cut off Corrin's reassurance as he slapped aside her gestured hand. "I AM NOT CAPTAIN LICHT! I am... I am..."
He'd now completely forgotten his name other than "Captain Licht." This, in spite of the fact that he knew for certain that "Captain Licht" wasn't his real name.
Being utterly cornered, both physically and mentally, [CENSORED] then runs off from the group and towards elsewhere, screaming and raving all the while, the world around him now no longer made any sense at all.
"WHO AM I?!" he cried out as he ran like the wind. "WHO AM I?! WHAT'S MY NAME?!" WHOSE MEMORIES ARE THESE?! SOMEONE GET ME OUT OF THIS MEAT-SUIT OF A BODY!"
Stripping himself off his robes and shirt, he began clawing at himself fiercely, trying to excavate himself from a body that didn't belong to him, drawing blood and hoping that among the blood that wasn't his, he could find some that felt like it belonged to him. He didn't know whose body belonged to originally, only knowing that this body wasn't his.
He thought and thought until his mind kept repeating the same memories over and over despite his bestest efforts to find something different. It was maddening, frightening, for [CENSORED] to live a life that wasn't his, to the point where a puppet on strings had more freedom by the virtue of being ignorant to the truth that it's existence wasn't its own.
He had no such luxury, as the fear and madness blinded him as his legs kept pumping like out-of-control pistons, not caring where he had to run towards as long as he can find some answers.
The group then followed the trail of scattered articles of clothing that were left behind.
"... What happened to him?" asked Corrin as she then picked up his Golden Dawn robes before looking towards Brigid for answers. "... Is this an occurrence in Ulster?"
"Honestly, no," the artificial spirit confirmed. "Even with the most potent of drugs, no Ulsterian went so far as self-denial of their very own existence."
"Something stinks," Ogmios remarked. "... Normally, I'd leave him to his fate, but we can't be picky right now in our choices of meat shields. That and if we don't solve this mystery, it's gonna bite more us in the ass down the line. Come on!"
Ignoring the second to last part of what he'd said, the group then run off towards where Licht had run off towards, following the trail of more clothes and droplets of blood that were left behind.
"CAPTAIN!" Corrin cried out as the other continued their pursuit. "CAPTAIN!"
"Hey Roland!" Vanica then picked up a pair of boxers from the ground. "I guess we found another membership to your nomenclature-OW!"
Roland then sheathed [Durandal] after bonking the brat with the flat of his blade. "Not cool, man."
"Well, I suppose the trail ends here," sighed Zenon as he noticed even the blood splatters were becoming harder to detect. But just before he could advocate searching blindly, he then notices something off with the upcoming section of the forest. "... Uh, guys? Forests are green and brown, right?"
"Yes," nodded Rinaldo.
"Then why am I seeing bright, luminescent colors up ahead?!"
Everyone then finds said splash of bright colors breaking through the dim colors that surrounded them.
"... He's definitely in there," Ogmios sighed. "Come on, let's get this next shitfest done and over with-why is it moving towards us?"
True to his word, the color was then revealed to be spreading out like an infestation. From the glow emerged a cluster of mushrooms with stubby arms and legs with hideous faces on their waxy stocks topped with bioluminescent caps.
"Shit, [Myconids]," Brigid cursed as she began combining [Fire] and [Wind] spells. "Everyone, whatever you do, don't breathe in their spores-"
"Uh, about that," Ogmios then pointed to their surroundings now being encroached by the glowing swarm of waddling fungi and their glowing byproducts spawning more of the former to repeat the latter. "Hope you all packed your bags, because we're all about go on a trip."
Corrin nervously chuckles as she and the others now found themselves in a bigger crunch they could ever imagine. "Game over man..." she chuckled in resignation as everyone began to trip balls. "Game over."
The world around them turned absolutely colorful.
To Be Continued...
Author's Notes: The past week was an eventful one. Got accepted to my local library and my training begins shortly after this chapter's upload, bought the Sunbreak expansion for my Monster Hunter Rise for a discounted price, and this website not showing any new views despite reviews being submitted since two week ago.
For the last part, please leave reviews so that I can know for sure that this fic is getting readers.
So Ishtar's reputation as "Hell's Ultimate Sword and Shield" is set in place with her numbers-crunching [Gauge Magic] having the power to control all taps related to anything that can be measured numerically. Part of the reason why her "fight" with Dagda wasn't a one-sided slaughter was that Ishtar is a kind of a Demon who and I quote Dracule Mihawk from One Piece (2023), doesn't hunt rabbits with a cannon. It's only when she accidentally (and later, deliberately) pushes the half-Demon's buttons that she takes the fight semi-seriously, but more so to test the Caligula-Demon baby's powers like how companies test their new products to see if they're worth selling. Yeah, she has a bad habit of not employing a deliberate "Curb-Stomp Battles" when she's more than capable of doing so, but given that she's smart enough to have the thought of retreating, this can be a case where sanity is a disadvantage. Then again, she's a believer in "time is money," so capitalist mindset dictates that she uses her resources accordingly, nigh-limitless as they are.
And speaking of Dagda, he's a walking contradiction. Put it simply, by Ulster's standards, he's the best boss to work under by the fact that he's keeping several Ulsterians together for a long time, while in conventional/Clover Kingdom standards, he's a potential workplace hazard, as evident by him punching Cernunnos in the face upon waking up. Even he has issues, now that it's revealed that he's (one of many) the Demon of [Lust], Asmodeus's children. Being a biological progeny of a rapist does things to people, and Dagda, bad as he got, is relatively well-off mentally save for implied attachment issues.
This chapter does show off the other members of the Twrch Trwyth Tavern group's prowess. Cernunnos having access to a pair of spears that can ignore all defenses (but unlike [Anti-Magic], it can't cancel out any spell, only defensive spells are eligible) and inflict wounds that will never heal through a special type of muscle-relaxant poison (Ishtar can't stop the bleeding, but by reducing the blood loss to that of a paper cut, she won't die from it despite the wound being still there). Combined with his revealed Fey heritage, he's not exactly the kind that should be taken lightly. For Lugh, he's massive case of "Blessed With Suck" trope, both related to his [Solar Magic] and his Highlander status. Former is also tied to his biology, meaning that if he's deprived of sunlight, then he's weakened to the point where he's no stronger than an average man. Paired that up with his Highlander status of immortality (implied that he drank the same kind of piss as Saiga did during the time when he went by Wotan), the likelihood of him going into "And I Must Scream"-status is pretty high, meaning Dagda has to babysit him until he gets his dose of Vitamin D.
As for Patry/Captain Licht/[CENSORED], the fact that he's not only forced to play a role that isn't his, but combined with the "False Memories" trope that he's painfully aware of and the fact that his memories are being modified to become like William's (down to the interface screw of "Captain Licht" being written as Captain Licht and William's and later Patry's names being [CENSORED] out), all of that piled onto a brain that is of a teen's (rough approximation), then it was a matter of "when" he was going to break. And now, add an entire atmosphere's worth of hallucinogens into the mix thanks to the cluster of [Myconids] that he might've wandered into, along with everyone else who gave chase.
And that's not bringing up the fact that [Leshy] is digging up dead gods and retrofitting them into his monsters to enact revenge on those who've strayed from their faith, even doing the whole "human sacrifices" schtick that some polytheistic religions did back during the BC era. And that there's also one (or a few) person(nel) that's/'re currently missing. All of the characters within the scattered group will be reintroduced in the next chapter. Then they'll reunite. And finally reach the end of this nightmare of a Dungeon.
References:
- Ishtar's [Gauge Enhancement Magic: Combo Dealer] is based off Kamen Rider Pard-DX Perfect Knockout Gamer Level 99's [Gashacon Parabragun]'s "Combo" gimmick, where a single blow actually deals the number of blows equivalent of the number of times where said Rider mashed the weapon's B-button.
- Dagda's secondary [Push Magic] is based off My Hero Academia: World Heroes' Mission movie's Flect Turn's [Reflect] Quirk, right down to it being completely autonomous from the user himself.
- Cernunnos's revealed Relics, [Gae Dearg] and [Gae Buidhe] are Diarmuid Ua Duibhne's famed twin spears that can inflict mortal wounds that cannot heal. The spears, in fact, act as his "horns," reflecting his namesake Cernunnos as the "horned god" in Gaelic Mythology.
- Lugh's [Solar Magic: Gae Assail], is named after his namesake's famed spear from Gaelic Mythology.
- [Chloris] is named after the Greek nymph/lesser goddess of spring, flowers, and new growth. It's design is based off Iris Cantus from NEO: The World Ends with You, BloomLordmon from the Digimon franchise, and its weapons are based off Garangolm's thermodynamic gimmicks for its arms from Monster Hunter Rise: Sunbreak.
- David indirectly addresses Malthusian Theory when bringing up Clover Kingdom's surprising food stability despite it suffering the worst of the Rain of Steel's effects.
- Cu's reference to a fellow Ulsterian who died by attempting to eat a tree to prove that he's a Highlander/immortal is a reference Nathaniel Northwest's (alleged, still ambiguous) cause of death from Gravity Falls.
- [Tefnut] is named after the Egyptian goddess of moisture, moist air, dew, and rain. It's design is based off the Mizutsune from Monster Hunter, being a composite of its Apex and Soulseer subspecies, with its Hellfireblight of the former and the pink hued cherry blossom aftereffect from the latter.
- Ogmios quotes Cinnamon from Dragon Ball Z Dead Zone Abridged when the group find themselves surrounded on all sides by the [Myconid] clusters.
- The scene where Corrin's group end up at the [Myconid] cluster is a small reference to the Aliens movie and Corrin quotes Hudson's memetic line when the Space Marines end up at a Xenomorph nursery full of dormant Facehuggers. Also, the [Myconids] are designed after the [Morphean Mushroom]/[Funghoul]/[Mushroom Mage] family of Plant Monsters that debuted in Dragon Quest III.
And as usual, please leave a comment or a review, for I'd love to know what my readers think!