Barbarian in a Failed Game

295. The Great Forest (2)

Ashfield couldn’t hide his confusion.

Being close with the Scion of the Arch Demon? That nonsense was irrelevant from the start. What unsettled him was the sheer prowess of the opponent who had effortlessly blown him away.

A demon contractor’s strength is primarily determined by the rank of the demon they contract with, followed by the level of power bestowed through the contract. The contractor’s own skill is secondary.

Ashfield was the sole contractor of Calisidus, the top-ranking demon under Behelanokto, the Scion of the Arch Demon.

There were few in Midland who could rival him. Most contractors had pacts with demons lower in rank than Calisidus, and the one contractor who had a pact with the them only received the most trivial power, thus wasn’t overwhelmingly strong.

‘But that guy…!’

BAM!

Ashfield’s eyes trembled violently as he rose from the rubble of the hideout’s outer wall. Could he have contracted with a demon higher than mine?

That was the only explanation for Ashfield’s helplessness. Yet, he couldn’t accept that fact.

BAM! BAM BAM!!

The pure dark energy emanating from the lunatic, who was mowing down charging beast chieftains with a crazy laugh, was too serene. Among demon contractors, there was a standard for gauging the grade of dark energy.

It was the savagery felt from the dark energy. The higher the demon’s rank, the more vicious and ferocious the dark energy would be.

‘Such a calm dark energy….’

Initially, when Cunning Claw returned and spoke of a demon contractor offering support, Ashfield assumed the person was an Imperial spy. The possibility of an unknown contractor suddenly coming to the Great Forest to offer support seemed less plausible.

But Ashfield’s assumption was wrong.

That guy was indeed a demon contractor. Reluctantly, Ashfield had to acknowledge that the man had contracted with at least an equal or higher-ranked demon than Calisidus. So why had he come to the Great Forest, opposing Ashfield and the forest?

“You seem troubled.”

“Shaman….”

Grit. Grit.

At that moment, a figure that seemed to embody ominousness in the form of a beast appeared before Ashfield.

A beast-man with a hunched back like an elderly human, a bushy white beard that covered his eyes, a broken fang, and bone ornaments and a staff made from human skulls and fingers, proclaiming his role as a priest of the Beast God.

Lastly, his eyes.

“That one. It seems he follows a different path than you, Ashfield.”

The murky green light leaking from his closed eyelids was the source of the shaman’s eerie aura.

“I’ll handle my troubles myself…!”

“Of course, you should. But.”

“Instead of spouting nonsense, block the additional troops properly… Ahk!”

What is this…?! Blood gushed out of Ashfield’s mouth as he glared at the shaman with wide eyes.

The shaman’s staff had pierced through Ashfield’s heart and protruded out from his back.

“It’s troubling… Of all times, to be opposed by someone who has made a pact with a Monarch of Hell. Right at the cusp of our grand achievement, this has become very troubling indeed.”

“…!”

Ashfield, so shocked that he momentarily forgot about his heart being pierced, spat out more blood. Monarch of Hell? Had that guy really entered into a contract with the Scion of the Arch Demon…?!

“There’s no need to be so surprised. You people, the demonic contractors, seem to easily form factions and cooperate. But the Monarchs of Hell are different. They are like wolves, always looking for a chance to stab each other in the back. Demons, after all, are that way. And to those rulers, the demons under them are just disposable pawns.”

“… You, don’t tell me!”

Crunch!

The shaman, who was grinning slyly, twisted the staff made from human bones, shredding Ashfield’s heart.

“A servant of that demon is even easier to dispose of…”

Crack…

Ashfield’s attempt to speak was cut short as the shaman crushed his head underfoot. As Ashfield’s body, now missing its head and with its heart pierced, began to crumble,

“I will give you a chance to resolve this on your own, Ashfield. Whether you want it or not…”

The shaman’s dark green eyes curved in a sinister smile.

***

Thud!

“Is this the end now?”

The number of chieftains who attacked him was three in total. The Cunning Claw had his head smashed and killed from the beginning. The bear chieftain, called the Crouching Bear, was split in half by Draupnir.

And the one who just got his face smashed like a balloon by Khan’s punch was the last one. This one was also a named chieftain. Something like Strong Jaw, if he remembered correctly.

“Well, it doesn’t matter.”

Strong Jaw or Hard Face, whatever.

Rumble!

As the chieftains were swept away helplessly, the rest of the beastmen were in disarray. Meanwhile, Khan’s comrades, who had been waiting outside, began to move. Their role was to reduce the number of fleeing beastmen by forcefully opening the tunnel entrance that Khan had damaged with Jan’s spell.

This hideout was one of the core shelters of the beastmen, filled with elite warriors who could make a difference on the front lines. If they could decisively reduce their numbers here, it would significantly lighten the burden on the front lines.

“Half of the chieftains who should be leading the front lines have been wiped out. If Ashfield is also taken down here, it should be enough to change the tide of the war.”

Come to think of it, the shaman was nowhere to be seen….

Having dealt with the chieftains, Khan’s attention turned to the shaman who should be in the hideout. Just then, dark magic began to surge from the direction Ashfield had been thrown. No, it wasn’t just the dark magic that was going wild.

“… This is.”

Another transcendent presence, a divine aura. The sticky dark magic rising from where Ashfield was, mingled with an emerald green aura, exponentially increasing its power.

The emerald green aura soon engulfed the dark magic as well, resurrecting Ashfield, who had died with his head and heart lost. And he could feel a gaze from where the head should have been empty.

“Beast God…!”

His entire body tensed up.

A God not belonging to the heavens, just like Karyan. The only God of the beastmen, who had absolute support from them.

『─────.』

Zing.

With a slight pain, the will of the transcendent being penetrated his mind, transmitting the Beast God’s emotions without any filter. Interest, joy, anger, rage…. Incompatible emotions swirled together, invading Khan’s mental world.

『So filthy.』

Then, the tenant in his mental world—a grudge—sent out a grumpy thought, and the headache that had been bothering Khan disappeared completely.

『The Beast God. There was nothing as crazy as him. Even though he wasn’t drunk on chaos, he was harder to predict than those consumed by chaos.』

This was something he didn’t know.

Even if he knew of the Beast God’s existence, there hadn’t been enough exposure for the player to know about his nature. Even when the beastmen was destroyed in the war against the empire, the Beast God had never revealed himself much.

So why now? Why was he revealing himself before Khan now?

“It’s me.”

『──────.』

At that moment, the Beast God once again spread his will.

“……”

“……”

Like a lie, the entire area fell into a silence as if devoured by stillness.

“What’s wrong with them all of a sudden?”

“Ron, look over there!”

Their comrades, charging forward from the rear while cutting through the beastmen in a straight line.

“Oh… I never imagined he would descend in person…”

The shaman, scattering emerald green light through his closed eyelids.

“Tsk….”

Gordi Khan clicked his tongue in annoyance.

『───.』

Only the Beast God, who had taken over Ashfield’s body, could move freely in the silence.

At least hundreds to a thousand elite beastmen members had frozen as if turned to stone, their heads twisted grotesquely, all staring towards the Beast God.

『You. God? Human?』

A sentence, properly structured, carried the will of the Beast God to Khan. The words were awkwardly arranged, like someone struggling with a foreign language, but the meaning was clear enough.

The intense curiosity of the transcendent gaze replaced the clumsy sentence.

『Asking. God? Human?』

“I don’t know, you bastard.”

『Not. God. Not. Human. You. What. Answer. No. Die.』

What the hell is this bastard saying?

Just as Khan frowned at the increasingly crude words of the Beast God—

Crash… Boom──!!

A collision occurred between Ashfield’s resurrected body and the spot where Khan stood, shaking the entire hideout. Following this, five or six more loud bangs erupted in succession.

No one could comprehend the course of the collision. Even the person who responded to the sudden onslaught could barely manage to counterattack and nullify it.

‘They said he’s crazy, and his temperament is incredible…!’

Drip.

The attack, which he couldn’t completely block, left a long scar on his forearm, with blood flowing in three streams to the ground. Moreover, the claw marks of the beast were not only on his forearm but also on Khan’s thigh and shoulder.

Khan, belatedly realizing the presence of his wounds, furrowed his brows. He thought he had read the signs of the power and raised the ash to block it all. But he had been injured by the Beast God’s attack.

‘I wasn’t injured.’

The wounds just appeared. The moment the Beast God’s power was activated, the injuries on Khan’s body were already a certainty.

『Why. Not. Death. Fate.』

If roughly interpreted, it seemed to mean, “You should have died, so why didn’t you?”

He had a rough idea. The ash-gray Khan possessed must have protected his body from the influence of the power. The Beast God’s power was of the type where one had to die the moment it was activated.

“What kind of power is this…?”

Suddenly, he realized anew.

The power of the ash-gray was never absolute.

Most importantly, he was just wielding it without truly understanding it. To fight against such monstrous beings, he needed to delve deeper into the nature of the ash-gray.

『You. Remember.』

The Beast God, who had made Khan reflect on himself by displaying his savage power, spread a low, threatening will. Leaving behind a menacing will, promising to remember him, Ashfield’s body began to rapidly disintegrate. It was the cost of the backlash from using the Beast God’s power.

That wasn’t all.

“Oh, God of the tribe…”

“Oh, God of the tribe…”

The bodies of the beastmen members, which had been frozen since the Beast God’s appearance, also began to disintegrate like Ashfield’s. The gruesome sight of the beastmen members’ sturdy bodies, tougher than most orcs, melting down like slime made Jan retch and gag.

Then, through the mouth of the shaman, the Beast God, with his emerald green eyes, uttered his final words. They were so clear that his previously awkward speech felt like an act.

『Soon. I will come. Before chaos arrives─』