abyrinth Encroachment Part 7

Dino and Zegion.

The two of them were up against Mad Evil Dragon Zero and were brushing away his attacks.

Their first aim was to get out of the labyrinth-in other words, get outside of Zero's body.

"Even still, there's no end to this..."

Dino complained while destroying Zero's clones using Deep Bullet.

Zero, who had unified completely with the separated labyrinth and gained its authority, could multiply himself inexhaustibly.

Each and every one of these clones had the strength equal to the previous Zero and, on top of that, they resurrected.

Even if Dino and Zegion defeated the clones, the corpses would just regenerate again and it wouldn't mean anything.

After all, as long as the labyrinth is part of Zero's main body, he could use its energy as much as he wanted.

"Abilities which release energy are meaningless. The enemy will benefit from all of it."

Zegion warned Dino, while mincing up Zero with his gleaming feathers.

His new skill, Collapsing Feather: Kuzuha, pulverizes the enemy using the vibration of the two wing.

By deploying high frequency waves in a direction, it chops up everything it touches.

On top of that, by becoming one with Zegion's mana, it can change its property according to the enemy.

Along with All Heaven Vision, by acquiring a means to attack in all direction, Zegion now had no blind spots.

Although Zegion had gained all that, after meeting up with Dino, he hadn't used any of those magic emitting abilities.

He was dealing with Zero with direct attacks and wing slashes.

The reason behind that was because of the aforementioned labyrinth's power.

Zegion was the strongest guardian of the labyrinth and was well aware of its nature.

Dino's energy was colossal and exceeded that of Zegion's.

But while that may be true, it isn't that he can never run out of energy.

Although it wouldn't be a problem to him even if he used thousands of Deep Bullet, the situation becomes different when the enemy is able to absorb all of that in as well.

"Are you serious? Then is Zero using Ramiris' labyrinth's power only on him or something?"

Zegion answered by silently nodding to Dino's question.

Seeing that, Dino was immediately depressed.

Zero was able to resurrect his clones until the labyrinth's energy depleted.

All of these were Zero, moving under his unified will.

The only thing they had going for them was that Zero's skill wasn't as good anymore as his 'self' collapsed.

However, dragon species are still dragon species.

Even when looking at just energy, it was still slightly more than Dino's-that was how absurd it was.

"Oi, Ramiris! Doesn't the labyrinth have any weaknesses? They just keep resurrecting no matter how many times we kill them!!"

[Are you stupid?! My labyrinth has no weak point!

It has unlimited floors and can even cut off contact with the outside world. It's obviously impossible to escape!]

"Are you stupid?! Don't put on airs!!-wait, we are having contact with you, aren't we?"

[Ahh, that is-]

According to Ramiris' explanation, the Mad Evil Dragon Zero's body, which was the labyrinth itself, was a completely isolated area.

No contact can be made, whether it's with telepathy or thought transmission, as the s.p.a.ce there is a hypers.p.a.ce.

However, as Rimuru had predicted this situation, his instructions for a counterplan was flawless.

This time, they were able to have contact with the outside world through Zegion.

By using Zegion and Rimuru's Soul Hallway, they were able to exchange information.

And this Soul Hallway is what's going to be the key to their escape from Mad Evil Dragon Zero's body.

"That means we weren't walking around without any objective..."

Dino was relieved upon hearing Ramiris' explanation since he was getting sick of going through countless pa.s.sages and still not being able to escape.

Dino's two swords cut up all the Zeros and tentacles which came growing out from walls and the floor.

The holy sword and the magic sword. The two swords had a white and a black aura surrounding them.

To stop the emission of energy, Dino switched to a style of fighting by covering his swords with his fighting spirit.

It appeared as if he was able to easily repel all the attacks but that was only due to Dino's sword skills being extremely high.

Although Zero didn't have a 'self', he was still very dangerous as he kept attacking out of instinct.

It was only because Dino possessed insane strength that the enemy couldn't even come close.

The same could be said for his companion, Zegion.

At the front, Zegion and Dino walked side-by-side, taking care of all the hindrances.

At the middle, Pico was walking with Gaia and Gracia was in charge of defending and being wary of the back.

Conserving energy as much as possible and dealing with the attacks by only using the sword was harder than they thought.

But even then, it wasn't like they were getting tired or anything, they just felt that it was a bother mentally.

Dino was thinking that it would be better to stay and encamp in a place if it was useless beating the enemy but...

According to Ramiris, such actions were not useless and were the most close to reaching the outer wall.

In the first place, as they were in the opponent's ring, which he can control sections as he pleases, staying in one place wasn't a smart idea.

[Well, that's how it is, so can you move to the designated site?]

"I got ya. So, what do we do after getting there?"

[You send it flying. With your strongest attack, you escape by piercing through the wall!]

".....Is that possible?"

[It's not a matter of whether you can or not, you just do it. There aren't any other way to escape, you know?]

"-Ah, I see."

Dino judged that it was useless asking any further.

As long as Ramiris says they have to do it, they have to do it.

All that's left is whether they can pull it off.

As her instruction was to use the strongest move, they probably didn't need to consider the consumption of energy.

After all, as long as they get through the wall, it doesn't really matter if they lose a bit of energy.

Now the problem was how much energy would be needed.

Dino thought about his abilities.

First, his Ultimate Skill: Belphegor, which he didn't even plan on acquiring.

This specialized in spiritual attacks.

By incorporating the Ultimate Skill Belphegor's Perception Obstruction, he could strengthen the unfamiliar greatsword to the point it turned into a phantasmagoric sword.

Its affinity to his two sword style was even better.

However, its effect towards someone in rampage state like Zero would be low. It is extremely unfortunate, but Belphegor will be useless.

He also thought of releasing all his abilities at once but if he fails after doing that, there won't be another chance. Dino deemed it better to preserve it as his trump card.

Then what should he do?

(I guess I have no other choice but to use that...)

Dino let out a sigh, as if he had given up and made up his mind on using another ability he would have liked to keep hidden.

Ramiris and the others in the control room were also doing their best to deal with the situation.

As it was unclear whether Dino would turn against Velda, they were preparing so that it won't be a problem either way.

If Dino teamed up or decided to be eaten by Zero, they had planned to throw the separated Labyrinth into the 'Infinite Corridor'.

But now that Dino was an ally, they had to safely get him out of Zero's body.

If it was just Zegion, they planned on using the 'Soul's Hallway' to forcibly get him out of there.

They could get him out even if he pierced the wall for just a moment.

But when Dino and his allies need to escape as well, a big hole must be created on the wall.

It was dangerous to teleport them in an unstable situation.

It wouldn't have been much of a problem either if it was just Dino either. But as Pico and Gracia also need to escape and they are weaker than Zegion and Dino, it wasn't certain if they would be able to endure the travel between the hypers.p.a.ce.

And so, they needed to make the situation full proof.

Besides that, there was another problem.

It was the fact that Zero had evolved into a dragon species.

Although they were informed by Rimuru of the possibility of it happening, since the info was really vague, being 'Hmm, it will probably be fine?', they didn't really think much of it.

And as such, they had decided that if by chance such a situation occurs, they would immediately contact Rimuru.

As such, while Ramiris was guiding Zegion and the others, Benimaru was contacting Rimuru.

And like this, the people in the control room were continuing work according to the manual decided upon at the beginning.

"Kufufufu. To think a new 'dragon species' would actually be born.

As expected of Rimuru-sama, it looks like you had seen through everything."

Inside the control room, an excited laughter echoed.

It was Diablo.

It seems that he came after being instructed by Rimuru.

He instructed the people, who were panickedly getting up from their seats seeing him, to continue working with his hands.

Looks like the demon operators were still a bit afraid of Diablo.

"Ou, Diablo. You're fast."

"Of course.

It wouldn't have been a problem if Zero's evolution stopped after being one with the labyrinth but...

Now that he has become a new dragon species, we can't leave it alone."

"That is true. Even though I had heard that it was a possibility, it's still surprising...

And Rimuru-sama predicted this far, as well. As expected of him."

"What are you saying? This much is normal for him.

More importantly, Benimaru-dono, it seems your recovery rate is still not enough.

I shall share some of my energy."

"Oh, that will help. I was just thinking that my recovery wouldn't be enough if we were to beat that."

Benimaru's healing hadn't even reached half.

And so Diablo offered his own energy.

It isn't a method anyone could use but as Diablo can control Rimuru's Turn Null (Nothingness Collapse) energy, it was possible for him.

Gazing at those two, Ramiris said,

"The only ones here who can move in that s.p.a.ce are Diablo, Zegion and Benimaru.

Benimaru, you can properly use s.p.a.ce-time control, right?"

"It's fine, Ramiris-sama. Although I just got the hang of it."

"Alright! We have all the members then?

We might have had to call master or Rimuru if Dino didn't switch sides."

"Veldorsama is probably busy at the moment. He probably doesn't have the time for that."

"I see~ Well then, I guess you guys will just have to work hard.

It would have been bad if Dino didn't come to his senses, though!"

"Kufufufu. That is also exactly according to plan.

Rimuru-sama was confident that Dino-sama will join him, you know?"

"As expected of Rimuru. Well, I also believed that Dino would have a change of heart!"

Even while Ramiris and Diablo were having such a conversation, the others weren't resting.

And finally, the preparations were complete.

"Now then, are the preparations done? Let's staaart the final plan then~!!"

Along with Ramiris' command, the final plan was in motion.

Dino and the others had reached the area Ramiris instructed them to.

All that's left now was to act with the signal.

Ramiris started explaining to them.

[Listen properly, okay? We will have you guys escape that area first.

It will be fine if you just use medium level power to breakthrough the wall.

Then, Dino and Zegion, you guys will protect the other two and Gaia with your barrier and jump outta there.

After that, you guys will destroy that annoying dragon and return back!]

Dino just stood there blankly.

He couldn't understand what she said.

—Medium? What is that supposed to mean?

—Destroy that annoying dragon? No idea.

"Oi. Oi oi oi oi! Wait just a moment!

What is this? You're not counting me as one of the dragon subjugation members, right?!"

He also wanted to ask about the medium thing but the dragon subjugation was more of a problem than that.

Dino panickedly objected, that he didn't want to be in the dragon subjugation team.

However, there was no way that was going to work with Ramiris.

[You,

You will kneel in front of me for forgiveness, right?

If you don't earn some points here, who knows what will happen...

You can imagine what can happen, can't you?]

Dino didn't have any other choice but to give up.

On top of not being able to win in a quarrel with her from long ago, he wasn't in a position to be complaining this time either.

Dino resolved himself tearfully.

"I got it. So, what do you mean by medium level energy?"

[You don't even understand that?

It means to not go all out but still use some energy to create a hole in the wall!]

"Wait! As if I can understand such vague instructions...

Besides, didn't you just say to go all out just a while ago?!"

[Ah—, geez! You're so annoying with these trivial things...

Don't worry about it, just make a hole in the wall and escape.

Save up some power for a super strong all out attack to destroy the evil dragon after you get out, alright!?]

In short, her point is to make a hole in the wall while saving enough energy to attack the dragon, Dino thought.

(Good grief, such an irresponsible person. Although I shouldn't be the one saying that.)

It seems like these two somewhat similar beings can agree on something, surprisingly.

"Alright then, let's escape quickly!"

Dino leisurely took stance.

Now, all they needed to do was match their timing and break through the wall.

[You need to properly protect those two with your barrier, got it?

Otherwise who knows where they will end up after being swallowed up by the hypers.p.a.ce!]

Dino nodded.

Aside from Zegion, who was connected by the Soul's Hallway, the others didn't really have a footing in the hypers.p.a.ce.

Even then, Dino could somehow make it but Pico and Gracia will probably be easily swallowed up by the hypers.p.a.ce.

If they get caught up by the phase difference of the hypers.p.a.ce, there's no determining in which dimension they might end up in.

Because this world can even bend the flow of time, it was essential for them to reach that exact location there.

Even awakened demon lord level Pico and Gracia will have difficulty preserving their existence in the hypers.p.a.ce.

The lowest requirement for this was to be able to control s.p.a.ce-time.

It was an ultimate ability that even Benimaru just recently learnt.

"Listen, you guys probably can't move in the hypers.p.a.ce.

So grab on to me tightly, okay? Think that you can't return if you get washed away."

"Got it. We probably won't die but we sure won't know where we will end up."

"Dino, I believe in you."

"Leave it to me. We gotta go all way since we have come this far."

At that moment, Zegion brought out a certain object from 's.p.a.ce Storehouse' and handed it over to Dino.

"Hold this."

Dino took it as he was overwhelmed by Zegion, not letting him talk back.

It was a small round sphere.

"Hmm? Isn't this that thing Rimuru used to play around with?"

Looks like he had no intention of answering.

"Well, it's fine either way, I guess..." Dino grumbled and put it in his pocket, looking a bit sad.

The preparations were complete.

Escaping wasn't the end, there were also jobs that needed to be done after that.

Dino, who properly understood that, paid attention as to not mistake his energy allocation.

And then-

With Ramiris' signal, the four of them inside Zero released their power.