7DP 182.1
１８２．A Last-Ditch Comeback
TL : Cnine
ED/PF :
R1: [1-3], R2[3.5-5]
Part 1
――A way to take down the Demon Prince.
If such a thing existed, Barbara would agree to help without a moment’s hesitation.
「That said… help with what, exactly?」
Thanks to Char’s miracle of healing, Barbara could finally breathe properly again. Gasping for air, Barbara asked in a strained voice.
「Please use this.」
――Char reached into her bosom and carefully drew out something she seemed to treasure.
Seeing the item, and hearing a brief explanation along with an utterly simple plan, Barbara closed her eyes for a moment.
Just as Char had said, it really was a gamble with everything on the line.
However… It seemed to offer just a little more chance of success than Barbara blindly charging in head-on.
「... Got it. That sounds like a good plan!」
Burying her tangled emotions, Barbara tried to give a defiant smile, but there was something amiss about her smile.
「Thank you for trusting me.」
Char returned the smile, but hers was just as tense.
Both of them were bluffing at each other.
However―― There was no denying that there was no other way.
「Char. Godspeed.」
「Likewise, Barbara-san... I'll leave the rest to you.」
As soon as she finished treating Barbara's wound, Char dashed off.
―― Right toward the Demon Prince.
The Demon Prince was fully focused on striking down Sage Luroi, and the heroes were desperately trying to stop him.
Vines bursting through the cobblestones and layers of glowing chains wound around him, yet Jilbagias brushed them aside with ease and drove his spear forward.
Another priest was killed by him.
Sage Luroi was nearly at his limit from overusing magic, standing only through sheer force of will. Even so, he continued to keep Jilbagias’s curses in check.
But in just a few more seconds, even that meagre resistance would come to an end — Char and the others would be trampled under Jilbagias's feet.
「――!」
Char fought with all her might against the urge to flee that very instant. It was truly unbelievable that a shy merchant’s daughter like her could stand on the very front line of a war against the Demon King’s army.
And now, she was about to challenge a Demon Prince who was nothing short of a monster.
Everything that happened now felt like a nasty joke. If this were a dream, she wished it would end, she found herself thinking that, all too late.
Nevertheless, she knew that this was reality.
No matter how much she prayed or wished, awake or asleep, the young man she loved, the hero, would never return from the battlefield.
If I was to escape now.
I wouldn't be able to face him in the afterlife.
He probably wouldn’t blame me, rather, he might scold me, nevertheless.
Along the way, she picked up a blood-smeared shield someone had dropped. Startled by its heavy weight, she nevertheless raised it in front of her.
（――Father, mother, sorry.）
Finally, she silently apologised in her heart to her parents back at home, who were surely worried.
（I choose to die in this place.）
She steeled herself —— Then charged at the Demon Prince.
「――WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!」
For the first time in her life, the war cry she let out was cracked with fear and panic.
But precisely because of that, the girl’s scream — or rather, a shriek unfit for the battlefield — caught Jilbagias’s attention.
Caught in those suspicious crimson eyes that seemed to say, 『What could some weakling like this possibly want to—?』, she barely managed to hold back her instinct to freeze in fear.
She ran.
She closed in.
「【Hi Yet Lampus, Sut Hyel Mo(O Holy Light, Come To This Hand)】」
Wreathed in a silvery glow.
Sadly, however, Char’s power as a priestess was no more than mid at best, and her light was feeble compared to the others. She was poor at combat, her body was frail, and even the holy attribute’s physical enhancement granted her only the slightest benefit.
A few more steps and she would likely be swept aside by a single stroke of the Demon Prince's spear, killed instantly.
Yeah.
―― If things stayed as they were, that would be it.
（... Please... Grant me courage...!）
She tightened her grip on the object hidden behind her shield.
（A courage to step forward just like you!）
The thing that Char held so tightly in her hand was――
A small jar.
… The ashes of her beloved hero— A small jar holding what remained of him after he had charged into Emergias’s main camp and returned with nothing but his severed head.
Since that day, she had been akin to a walking corpse.
She kept praying, day after day.
She did that for months on end, without missing a single day.
She kept pouring her prayers into it—!!
The crystallisation of Char’s anger and hatred toward the demons, and her love for the hero.
『I have poured my magical power into it, transforming it into holy prayer without cease.』
This was the secret plan Char had explained to Barbara. She couldn’t use advanced techniques like enchantment, yet for some reason, power had taken root in these ashes, and these ashes alone.
『By using this, it'll envelop him in a powerful holy light, but only for an instant.』
It would last for less than the blink of an eye, but the ashes would release the holy power built up over months. And since Char was the one who had created that power, she should be able to reuse it as if it were her own magic.
『I will keep casting miracles to ease the pain and heal myself as much as possible.』
Whether she got cut down or stabbed to death, she'd cling to the Demon Prince until the bitter end, hindering his movements.
『With the holy light and my body, I should be able to create a blind spot. If I burn him with holy attribute at point-blank range, it should at least wear down his defensive ward a little. That's why, I leave the rest――』
―― Char clenched her teeth and glared at the Demon Prince before her as she closed in on him.
The Demon Prince’s face remained expressionless, yet his eyes narrowed slightly, almost as if pitying Char. Even as he did, the hero’s holy sword was smashed against his spear, and in one smooth counter, he reaped the life of another priest. All that remained were a battle-worn priest, the exhausted sage, and a forest elf archer whose arrows were spent.
The sage was still his top-priority target.
Thinking he might as well take Char down while he was at it,
Jilbagias's spear waved,
he unleashed a thrust at Char――
「――DEMON PRINCEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!」
Char broke the small jar as she raised that war cry.
『This demon prince isn’t the one who killed him』―― She knew that, yet she couldn’t stop herself from shouting.
She flung out the contents of the small jar, dousing herself from head to toe in the hero’s ashes.
The power of the prayers poured into it over months—— Was unleashed.
In that instant, silver flames erupted from Char’s body, flooding the dark district with light as bright as midday.
「What the」
Jilbagias’s eyes widened slightly in surprise, but he grit his teeth and drove his spear forward without mercy.
Straight into the silver-lit hero’s shield that Char held up.
The holy light imbued in the shield put up only the faintest resistance before it got mercilessly shattered by Jilbagias's spear. The spear tip cleaved through Char’s arm and drove deep into her chest――！
「――AAAAAAAAAAAARGH!」
Yet even as the spear tip pierced through her chest, Char did not stop. Clutching the spear shaft that was being pulled free, she pressed forward.
A massive surge of holy attribute was forcing Char’s body to move. The unbearable agony that even the miracle of healing could not quell, the fatal sensation of her lifeforce draining rapidly from her body.
Nevertheless,
Not even that agony was enough to stop her in her tracks.
「AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!」
A gush of blood spilled from her mouth with a wet sound. With each step, her vision grew more and more blurred.
Even so, she pressed forward. Forward! Slamming into Jilbagias's protective spells, she clung to the Demon Prince as if embracing him through the barrier.
Even after all this, all Char could do was hinder him.
The rest was...
（The rest is up to you―― Barbara-san――！）
She cried inside amidst her fading consciousness.
Her body was swaying.
Beyond the holy light of the girl that was walking straight into her own death,
A silhouette emerged from within.
Startled beyond measure by the priestess’s suicidal feat, Jilbagias snapped to his senses and looked up.
The first thing his red eyes saw was,