Chapter 135 ….
Bang! A loud gunshot rang through the night.
There was no longer any need to stay quiet to avoid waking others, so she wasn’t using a silenced bullet. A golden trajectory cut through the dark garden, striking one of the countless eyes of the mimic, which had finally revealed its true form.
Using that gunshot as a signal flare, Lindsay sprinted without hesitation. From the exact spot where they had been just moments ago—no, from the shadow of the garden tree that had been there—sharp black spikes shot up like spears.
Lillieta reached over Lindsay’s shoulder and fired in rapid succession.
Bang, bang, bang—each shot ruptured one of the mimic’s eyes.
Lindsay, carrying her in his arms, kept moving without stopping for even a second. From every shadow they passed, black thorns sprouted like blades before sinking back down.
Rita occasionally turned the muzzle downward and tapped Lindsay lightly on the shoulder. At that, she would immediately shut her eyes, and without fail, a flash grenade would detonate, shrinking the shadows. The spikes that nearly pierced the top of Lindsay’s foot withered away, repelled by the light.
A guttural growl, like that of a wild beast—or the low rumble of distant thunder—reverberated beneath the night sky. It came from the mimic, towering like a tree piercing the heavens, enraged by the humans scurrying around its feet and bursting its eyes one by one.
Yet even amid that chilling sound, the gunfire did not stop. Despite being slung over a lightning mage’s shoulder, her view and arms shaking wildly, the magic gunslinger’s aim remained deadly accurate.
Every golden trajectory pierced through whipping branches and the writhing multitude of shadowy hands, hitting their targets without fail.
‘I have to burst every single eye.’
Somewhere among those countless eyeballs, the mimic’s core was hidden. Only by destroying it could the creature be killed. In the past, not knowing this had led to prolonged, exhausting battles against endlessly regenerating mimics.
‘The mimic’s core isn’t a real eye, so it doesn’t blink.’
If she had time to calmly observe, she could pick out the single unblinking eye among the hundreds—but Rita had no such luxury now.
Luka and Gide weren’t there to block the attacks and buy her time. Ethan and Ys weren’t around to distract the mimic or keep it from fleeing or attacking others while she searched for the core.
‘And Olly isn’t here to safely isolate the battlefield. So for now, the only option is to keep the mimic’s attention on us and shoot out every eye.’
The question was whether Lindsay’s stamina would hold out until then. She had prepared both a main plan and backup plans for that scenario.
[Ah, Miss, I—I’m sorry! I can’t! There’s just too many, it’s too dark, they keep squirming…!]
Hannah’s trembling voice came through the communicator. She was part of the contingency plan—stationed alone on the dome roof after Rita had jumped down, scanning the mimic for its core.
“It’s fine, Hannah. Don’t stress. Even if you can’t find it, if we burst them all, it’s over.”
[Y-yes… okay…]
If Hannah spotted the unblinking core eye and reported its location via comms, it would end the fight immediately. If she succeeded, the backup plan would become the best plan.
‘But with normal eyesight, finding the core in this situation is nearly impossible.’
The odds were too low. So the primary objective remained: destroy all the eyes. And if Lindsay’s stamina gave out before then…
“Persuasion’s done, switch!”
Richard shouted, having stopped the servants—who’d been awakened by the explosions—from rushing outside, locking the back doors of the mansion behind him. Lindsay dashed toward where Richard stood. Rita pointed her gun at the ground between them and shouted:
“Close your eyes!”
The moment Richard shut his eyes, she pulled the trigger. A flash grenade burst between Lindsay and Richard, thinning the shadows. The spikes that had been relentlessly targeting them faltered.
Taking that opportunity, Rita transferred from Lindsay to Richard. She perched on his thick arm, leaning her upper body against his broad shoulder.
As per the plan, Richard had changed into his paladin armor during the preparations, the silver-white plates gleaming faintly in the darkness. Resting her arm on the smooth, wing-engraved metal over his shoulder, Rita muttered:
“It’s been a while since I’ve seen you in armor, Oppa.”
“What, do I look cool all of a sudden?”
“No, I was just worried your weakened body wouldn’t be able to handle the weight anymore.”
“Hey, you little—”
“Run!”
Richard, who was about to grumble, immediately broke into a sprint at her signal.
Rita kept bursting the mimic’s eyes to keep its attention away from the exhausted Lindsay, who had collapsed to the ground, panting.
Meanwhile, Richard ran with her in his arms, tearing through the garden—down gravel paths between hedge mazes, across the lawn.
The members of House Lascaille, clinging to the mansion windows, stared down in stunned silence at the surreal chase unfolding in the garden.
A blonde woman wearing a tattered negligee and a cloak was carried in the arms of a red-haired knight. The black cloak billowed like the wings of a black dragon behind the silver armor, while her long, tied-back golden hair trailed behind like a shining tail.
Black spikes followed in their wake like footprints. Gunfire fell like rain, golden trajectories linking the pair and the monster, while intermittent white flashes exploded, driving back the shadows.
It was such a spectacular sight that most could only watch in awe. But to the Duke and Duchess, it only looked like their daughter and son were in deadly danger. They clung to each other, holding their breath.
Rita cooled her overheated gun barrel with processed od and thought to herself,
‘It’s about time it got angry—ah.’
Her gaze lifted upward. The mimic, which had until then been rooted like a tree by the warehouse and firing spikes from afar, finally began to rise.
Its shadowy, writhing roots burst through the old warehouse, smashing it to pieces as they emerged, and stomped onto the ground like the foot of a giant.
The neatly kept lawn was crushed and torn apart, exposing the raw earth beneath. Covered in eyes and shadows, the monster dragged its feet, leaving the garden in ruins.
The massive creature bent forward, looming over the fleeing humans like a predator over mice. The moon was blotted out, and shadows fell across Richard’s silver armor and her black cloak.
From the top of the beast, branch-like appendages cascaded down like a waterfall, while spikes rose from the shadows below like spear tips.
“Stop, Oppa!”
Lillieta aimed her gun at Richard’s feet while raising her other arm high. Her black cloak unfurled like wings, covering them overhead, and beneath it, a flash grenade exploded.
Light drove away the spikes, while the cloak blocked the falling branches. Her arm, straining under the tremendous weight, began to buckle—only for Richard’s arm to move in and support it.
‘The cloak’s holding better than expected. I won’t need to use the shield rounds. In that case…!’
While Richard held up the cloak, freeing one of her hands, Rita pulled real bullets from her inner pocket and quickly loaded them into her magic gun. These weren’t od-processed bullets—they were physical ammunition.
They were custom-made rounds she had ordered as a demonstration when planning the training curriculum for the Trittoma magic gunslingers.
A secondary measure for when output restrictions were in place:
‘Use real bullets to supplement firepower.’
She racked the slide and aimed the gun with both hands toward the mimic’s massive body, barely visible beneath the cloak.
Incendiary Munitions.
Bullets containing combustible material that ignite upon impact.
Normally, pistol-sized incendiary rounds wouldn’t be very practical—but when combined with a magic gunslinger’s processing, they became more powerful than most artillery shells.
‘Since I’m using real bullets, I can focus all the od that would’ve gone into bullet and powder processing into enhancing the incendiary material.’
With a thunderous boom more like a cannon than a handgun, the bullet was fired. Upon embedding itself in the mimic’s root-like foot, white flames erupted, wrapping around the monster’s base and refusing to die down.
A roar like a raging thunderstorm echoed as the branches pressing down on them recoiled upward. Rita shouted swiftly:
“Run, Oppa!”
“Rita.”
But instead of moving, Richard called her name in a low voice. At that moment, she noticed blood trickling down the silver armor on his raised arm.
Her face went pale. Richard lowered his arm.
One part of the cloak was torn—the section that had been scratched earlier when they had jammed it into the mimic’s maw. A thin, sharp black branch had pierced through that weakened spot and embedded itself in a gap in the armor.
“I wasn’t going to use it, but something stabbed me, and my aura flared up instinctively.”
Ominous frothing bubbled around the point where the branch was lodged. Richard smiled weakly with trembling lips.
“In this case… I don’t have a choice, do I?”
Rita didn’t answer. There was no time to talk. She quickly reached out, dabbed the blood flowing down his armor, and pressed their palms together, drawing a sigil.
It was the contingency plan they’d discussed earlier—for accidents or unforeseen variables. If Richard were ever tainted by the monster…
“Well, maybe it’s for the best.”
He was abandoning everything—
the dreams and aspirations he’d held since the age of thirteen,
his pious faith nurtured since childhood,
the values he’d built upon it,
the paladin identity he had just begun to reclaim,
his goal of returning to the Paladin Order,
a lifetime of belief, discipline, and training.
All of it, thrown away.
“Now I don’t have to hesitate anymore.”
He had already decided: to follow Rita’s words and trust her description of magical corruption—something he’d never witnessed himself—and become an Oathbreaker who renounced God.
“Rita, I won’t be able to keep my promise… to return to the Paladin Order.”
He smiled softly as he looked down at the sigil she had drawn and placed his hand on his throat, beginning to chant:
“〈Od, I make this vow.〉”
