Gacha Kingdom Building

--This chapter is written using Claire's POV--

During this event, Licia and I, along with the other girls, received a few level-ups, especially when the wars began.

Both of us reached level 84, with Mia just a few levels ahead of us.

This was already a level higher than Licia had before Miwen summoned her, and because of his Gift, she didn't need to invest as many points in crucial skills. As a result, her stats were even higher than her previous self's, though her skill set ended up slightly different.

Level-wise, I was still far from my prime, but...

There was no way I would be intimidated by that.

Even if our opponent was around twenty levels ahead of us.

Even if he was the fearsome prince with ten different Gifts.

And even if he had already defeated us once.

Claire: "...Tch."

Licia: "Watch out behind you."

While fighting against the Black Knight Normyu, undead puppet of his brother or not, something like a water puddle was easy to miss, especially with the chaos surrounding us.

However, even though the random magic fired by allies and enemies alike confused my mana sense, the moment I noticed that the puddle was filled with mana, instead of falling back, I immediately jumped over it.

Fire magic is hardly the best to use for defense, but thankfully, a good offense works just as well, so when the water puddle turned into a spiralling pillar of water, I was able to block it by sending three fire spears to clash against it.

Annoyingly, the water splashed, creating different puddles I had to be careful with, hindering my footing and restricting my movements a little too much for my liking.

As I clashed swords with Normyu, I felt like we were somewhat equal in strength, and I might even have the upper hand when it came to swordplay.

If his magic were of a different element, I could probably defeat him by supporting my swordplay with my magic like he does.

Unfortunately, this wasn't the case, and I couldn't engage him for too long before he used his magic or one of his Gifts.

Whenever this happened, I had no choice but to fall back.

If I were to be hit with the black curse again, I'd be left in the same position as before.

Nothing more than humiliated deadweight for Licia to carry...

That, I couldn't allow.

Still, being forced to fight slowly and carefully like this wasn't really my style. I knew that, like this, it would be just a matter of time before he overwhelmed me.

After all, this had already happened once...

Licia: "Time out~"

Claire: "Huff... Haah..."

When we sent Miwen off, Licia and I had briefly faced Normyu together, but as soon as he was far enough, we tested how we'd fare in a one-on-one battle against him, as per the secret agreement he had made beforehand.

Surprisingly, Licia was the one who proposed this. She's rarely prideful, but what happened last time seemed to sting her quite a bit.

Not that I minded, though. If anything, I quite liked seeing her being a little selfish since she's usually one of the most selfless around.

And well... I was dying to get a chance for a rematch, too, so... There was no way I'd complain about her idea.

Unfortunately, before I could land a single hit on him, my five minutes were over.

Claire: "Your turn..."

Thanks to a barrier she created to separate us, I managed to fall back to her side.

Licia: "Hmmm..."

In her face, I saw an expression I could never make.

She was troubled, thinking incredibly hard about something.

Once she was done, she confidently said-

Licia: "I'll pass."

Claire: "...Eh?"

Sometimes, I have no idea what goes on in her mind.

And no matter how casual she might be about it, I knew how serious she was about this rematch, so there was no chance she'd do anything just for fun. Probably...

Thankfully, she read my confusion and promptly explained her decision.

Licia: "I've seen enough to know I can't win alone. And I want to be with Mia as soon as possible, so... "

It was a very Licia-like response, but there was even more to it.

Licia: "Also, I confirmed our theory. He can only use one Gift at a time, and when he switches to another, there's a two-minute cooldown before he can use the same Gift again."

She even got the timing, huh...

I wonder if she planned to use me as bait from the start or if she truly only made her decision after watching me battle the black knight.

Nonetheless, it was great to have someone like her analyse the opponent for me.

It gave me the chance to focus completely on the fight and instinctively acclimate myself to his reactions.

However, two minutes, huh?

Claire: "It's going to be tough..."

Licia: "We already knew that, though."

I suppose.

Still... It's such a narrow window.

We could potentially make him put all of his Gifts on cooldown, but that would mean having him change Gifts every twelve seconds. Actually, that would be just enough for the cooldowns to return, so... Less than twelve at least once for a one-second window.

He should still be able to use magic regardless, and we know he has one ability to create a barrier we can't penetrate, so...

Claire: "That means going all-out!"

Licia: "Yep!"

Since we needed to overwhelm him quickly to make him use as many Gifts in the shortest amount of time possible, I started off by launching five fireballs against him.

These weren't particularly strong, nor were they too explosive, but I hoped that the numbers and the pattern would force him to respond with something other than his sword.

Licia had taken the opportunity to close in from the side as well, so forced to meet her sword head-on, he used the barriers to protect against the magic I launched.

As the two struggled, I also tried to charge at him as fast as I could.

But before I could reach strike distance, he had already triggered his second Gift, the one that causes three strikes from a single one.

That could have been fatal for Licia, and if he had triggered the Gift responsible for the Black Spot Curse that affected me last time, she'd probably be out of the fight completely, but to my surprise, that never came to be.

As soon as she noticed the barriers blocking my magic vanish and Normyu shift his pressure toward her blade, she quickly extended both the tip and the handle of her sword with ice, turning it into a dual-bladed polearm.

Her ability to adapt and how quickly she finds alternatives and solutions was as impressive as always, but the Gift he used, while simple, was a little too strong.

Licia could reasonably block Normyu's normal attacks, but this time, it was like three of him attacking at once, so he almost instantly broke her defense and pushed her back, the ice magic she used only delaying it by a second.

This was enough time for her to fall back, but she was left in a bad position, and it would be hard for her to protect herself against the next attack.

I tried to help by slashing at Normyu with my sword coated in fire, but he summoned a water vortex from the ground.

I couldn't get past it as the water shot towards the sky, only for it to curve midair and aim at Licia.

He charged at her alongside the water vortex coming from above, but she forced him to stop and turn his back to deflect the ice fragments coming from behind him.

These were the ones left on the ground after her ice blade was destroyed, and this allowed her to evade both him and the water vortex...

But she chose not to.

Instead, having regained her footing, she launched herself forward, aiming at his exposed back.

The water vortex had finally dissipated after hitting the ground and finding no targets, also giving me the chance to charge at him.

With enemies coming from the front and rear, and unable to use his barrier, he pulled another trick from his sleeve.

Suddenly, both of us fell to the ground.

My sword, my body, even the clothes I was wearing... They all felt much heavier.

I felt all of my muscles burn just to stand on my knees, and taking even a single step forward felt almost impossible.

This wasn't exactly new to me. I felt the same in our previous fight.

The third Gift he just used seems to give him gravity control.

Escaping it wasn't too hard, I propelled myself back by throwing explosive fire in front of me, and Licia did something similar by erecting an ice pillar from the ground beneath her, creating a platform in the air for her to stand on.

It seemed like this Gift had an area of effect around him, but since this might have been the same Gift he used to intercept my flame pillars back then, we couldn't tell if this was just the area he selected to affect this time, or if it's always around him.

And while we managed to get out unscathed, without confirming a change of Gifts, any attempt at close-quarter combat was impossible.

We managed to make him use three Gifts in about half a minute...

If we could keep up the pace, victory would be ours.

However, he still had seven Gifts left, some of which we had no idea about.

Because there was so much we still didn't know about him, it was hard to say whether or not we were in a better position than when the battle started.

When I thought about this, a low voice in the back of my head whispered words that made me slightly anxious.

It asked if I was going to win, but...

Claire: "Hahah..."

That only lasted a second, and I could only laugh at the idea of losing here.

He was a water-type magic user. An annoying one on top of it.

He was also an undead, and we already knew that it would take more than normal to put a permanent end to his unlife.

But even then...

I felt no fear.

Instead, I was feeling the thrill of an opponent who fired me up like no other had ever since Miwen summoned me.

One could truly go all out against.

Claire: "I'm gonna feel great after I burn you to a crisp, won't I?"

It didn't matter how much progress we had made in these thirty or so seconds.

After all, our battle against the black knight had just started~