Chapter 117: Satisfaction
Because the monster was finally beginning to understand one essential truth.
No matter how many times it struck this human...
She always got back up.
At last, that was enough to make its confidence falter.
Blanche drew a ragged breath.
Every inhale burned her ribs.
Her arms trembled beneath the weight of her axe. Her legs threatened to give way at any moment, and her vision blurred on and off.
Yet she never took her eyes off the Goblin Chief.
He, too, was at the end of his strength.
Blood poured freely from his gaping throat, his ruined eye socket, and his nearly severed leg. He breathed in ragged gasps, each inhale producing a sickening gurgle.
Only two survivors remained.
Two fighters refusing to fall.
The monster let out one final roar.
Weaker than the others.
Yet filled with desperate rage.
Then it charged.
Limping.
Heavily.
Each step shook the ground.
Blanche felt her heartbeat quicken.
She had nothing left.
No time to come up with another plan.
But the fight had to end.
She charged as well.
The two figures raced toward one another.
At the last possible instant, Blanche dropped to one knee.
The goblin's enormous axe swept through the air above her head, its wake carrying away a few strands of her red hair.
She slid beneath his arm.
Spinning on herself, she gathered every ounce of strength she had left into her shoulders, her hips, and her legs.
One movement.
Executed perfectly.
Her axe rose in a savage upward arc.
The blade found the exact wound she had opened moments earlier.
This time, nothing stopped it.
Steel tore through flesh already ripped apart.
Severed muscle.
Shattered the last of the resistance.
Then sliced clean through the Goblin Chief's neck.
Time seemed to slow.
The enormous head rolled heavily across the stone floor with a dull thud.
The body remained standing for a fraction of a second, as though incapable of accepting its own death.
Then it collapsed.
The impact echoed throughout the chamber.
A profound silence followed.
No more roars.
No more rumbling.
Only Blanche's ragged breathing.
Her axe slipped from her hands.
She fell to her knees, no longer able to support her own weight.
The blood covering her face dripped slowly onto the stone.
Her arms trembled beyond her control.
She remained there for several long seconds, staring at the giant corpse.
"...You were... really... one hell of an asshole..." she muttered between breaths.
An amused rumble answered her.
Phoenix shrank back to his smaller form and immediately rubbed his head against her shoulder.
Absentmindedly, Blanche ran a hand through his warm fur.
At that very moment, a golden light flooded the chamber.
The Goblin Chief's body disintegrated into a shower of glowing particles that drifted slowly toward the crystal ceiling.
Then, with a crystalline chime, a chest appeared at the center of the room.
This one was no longer made of crude wood.
Bound with blackened steel and reinforced with iron bands engraved with ancient runes, it looked as though it had been waiting centuries for its victor.
Blanche stared at it for a long moment.
Then burst into exhausted laughter.
"If you give me more gold... I'm burning this entire dungeon to the ground."
A blue window appeared, announcing her victory.
Blanche sighed.
She took the time to cast Rest, aching from head to toe.
Argy's healing spell was no longer enough.
She smiled when she noticed the timer.
More than five minutes remained.
I think you're at a huge disadvantage. You only have two or three combat skills, unlike the others.
Blanche nodded at her familiar's observation as she slowly recovered.
He was right.
Compared to Derek or Glen, who possessed formidable combat abilities, she was clearly at a disadvantage.
After all, they were warriors...
She was a mage.
That was precisely why she'd been training so relentlessly with D.
Even so, she felt as though she had failed spectacularly today.
Granted, she was still alive and had single-handedly slaughtered over a hundred goblins...
But her performance had been far from impressive.
By Babylon, that mob had pulled her hair and sent her flying across the room!
She couldn't suppress her frustration with herself.
Without her son's support spells...
Still, she opened the chest to examine her reward.
To her surprise, she found a Skill Scroll, along with another scroll granting her a Dimensional Inventory.
The first granted her the Master Blacksmith ability.
The second allowed her to carry objects with her regardless of the era or place in which she found herself.
No sooner had she finished reading the two scrolls than another blue window appeared.
\---
You will be transported outside the dungeon in...
One...
Two...
Three...
\---
Blanche closed her eyes.
The familiar sensation of teleportation immediately enveloped her.
For a brief instant, her body seemed to grow weightless, suspended between two worlds, before solid ground returned beneath her feet.
When she opened her eyes again, a salty breeze gently brushed across her face.
She was back on the beach.
That beach.
Pristine white sand stretched as far as the eye could see, bordered by a sea of crystal-blue water whose waves rolled softly onto the shore with a soothing murmur.
Far in the distance, the horizon blended seamlessly into the sky, making it impossible to tell where one ended and the other began.
A small smile tugged at her lips.
This was where she had agreed to take part in this little game for the first time.
Back then, she had actually believed it was a little game...
Until she'd realized that the word little would never apply to it.
As if to prove the point, an enormous figure emerged farther down the beach.
Fenrir was waiting for her.
Motionless.
His size was still profoundly absurd.
Even sitting, he towered over everything around him, his thick silver-gray fur rippling beneath the sea breeze like a living cloak.
His mismatched blue eyes, as ancient as the mountains themselves, were already fixed upon her.
He hadn't moved an inch.
As though he had always known she would return eventually.
His tongue hung lazily from his mouth as he watched her, visibly pleased.
At least one of them was.