The Tale of Hero Alice’s Social Death

Did Fugallo lose his mind? Alice didn't think so. From how Fugallo interacted with Haydn, Alice could see that Fugallo was very rational. It even looked like he had a friendly relationship with Haydn.

Haydn was the Rhine Kingdom's king. Yet, when faced with Fugallo's request to possess his body, he showed no signs of rejection or enmity. Instead, he merely expressed a hint of frustration. This meant that he wasn't being forced to let Fugallo possess his body. Instead, the two had most likely discussed it before and reached a mutual agreement.

If Fugallo could convince a human king to abandon his position and support a former Demon King's activities, it was highly unlikely he would be a lunatic out to destroy the world. After all, unless Haydn was similarly such a lunatic, there was no way he would agree to let Fugallo destroy the world.

But this still begged the question of why Fugallo was trying to gain so much strength. Was it for world domination? But if that were the case, he wouldn't need to endlessly create Demon King's Shadows to possess. One or two would be enough for him to surpass everyone in this world, including the Hero. After all, it was highly unlikely Fugallo had expected to encounter a "Hero" like Alice, who would have the assistance of another former Demon King.

Yet, Fugallo's aim from the get-go was clearly to endlessly increase his strength. In Alice's opinion, what Fugallo was trying to do was meaningless. After all, having too much strength wasn't necessarily a good thing. After a certain point, the power in one's body would oversaturate, causing one's body to collapse.

Although Alice couldn't understand Fugallo's behavior, she didn't try to understand it. It was pointless to understand Fugallo's goals if she got killed here.

"What should we do? We might have been able to win against him before, but I don't think we stand a chance now," Andusia asked Alice when she saw Fugallo retracting all of his mana into his body. They already had difficulty dealing with Fugallo previously. Now that Fugallo had grown significantly stronger, they stood no chance against him. At most, they could drag out the fight for some time, but it was still only a matter of time before they lost.

Not to mention, Alice had yet to recover her mana. After exhausting her mana to use Forest Crystal just now, she would probably need half a minute before she could make a full recovery.

"Anyway, I'll try to hold him back while you hurry up and recover your mana."

Immediately, Andusia moved in front of Alice. As soon as she did so, Fugallo also made his move, crossing the distance separating them and arriving in front of her in the blink of an eye. If there hadn't been a sufficiently large distance between them, Andusia might have been struck by Fugallo's attack without being able to react.

Fugallo was originally plenty fast already, thanks to his proficiency in wind magic. Now that his stats were further improved, Andusia could no longer cope with his speed by herself. Fortunately, Andusia didn't need to beat Fugallo. She only needed to buy enough time for Alice to recover. Then, they could deal with Fugallo together.

After Fugallo's strength increased, his attack method also saw a change. Although he was still trying to engage Andusia in a melee, he no longer used Weaponized Body to transform his body into a weapon. In reality, while Weaponized Body might be considered a taboo, it was on the weaker side of taboo-level spells. Normally, Fugallo would only use Weaponized Body when he was lacking mana or forced to engage his opponent in a melee.

Andusia had yet to realize this point. She was still of the opinion that Fugallo would fight her using Weaponized Body like how he fought Alice previously. So, she kept her eyes fixated on Fugallo's limbs in anticipation of an attack from them. However, even after Fugallo got within melee range of her, she failed to notice any of his limbs transforming into a weapon.

This bastard! He's not using Weaponized Body!

Like Fugallo, Andusia also had a wealth of combat experience. So, as soon as she realized Fugallo didn't plan to use Weaponized Body, she promptly abandoned all thoughts of trying to counter this taboo and used Chaos Barrier to create a gigantic, spherical barrier around herself and Alice. Since Andusia didn't know how Fugallo would attack her, the safest solution would be to erect an all-encompassing defensive barrier.

After realizing Fugallo wouldn't be attacking with Weaponized Body, Andusia instantly thought of many possible attack methods Fugallo would use. For example, Fugallo might summon a powerful storm using his prided wind magic and launch it at her barrier at point-blank range.

However, contrary to Andusia's expectations, Fugallo did not use any magic. Instead, he simply crashed his entire body into Andusia's Chaos Barrier.

Huh? What is this guy trying to do?

Andusia couldn't help but be stunned by Fugallo's actions. Demon Kings might possess powerful physiques, but they still weren't strong enough to go against taboos without the assistance of a taboo.

It was similar to how Fugallo had lost half of his waist after taking a direct hit from her Dark Sunburst. Although Fugallo's strength had further increased after possessing a second Demon King's Shadow, there was still no way he could do anything against a defensive taboo if he relied solely on his physical body.

However, as soon as this thought flashed in Andusia's mind, she immediately sensed something was amiss. This was because her Chaos Barrier was trembling after getting struck by Fugallo's physical body. It even felt like it was about to shatter.

What?!

Andusia hurriedly lifted her head to look at Fugallo. Then, she found that Fugallo's body was no longer limited to just a human shape. More specifically, a dragon-shaped phantom overlapped his body, making it look like the dragon was crashing into the Chaos Barrier with Fugallo.

Dragon's Shadow!

Demon King's Shadow and Dragon's Shadow were similar types of spells. Hence, it wasn't completely out of the question for a modification that could work on Demon King's Shadow to also work on Dragon's Shadow. Moreover, compared to Demon King's Shadow, Dragon's Shadow was a weaker taboo.

Hence, Fugallo, having already learned how to convert Demon King's Shadow into a possession-type magic, managed to possess the dragon projection summoned by Dragon's Shadow as well, further increasing his strength. Although the effects of this impromptu possession weren't permanent and would disappear only after a few seconds, it was more than enough for a sneak attack.

Meanwhile, dragons originally already possessed physical strength close to rivaling Heroes and Demon Kings. So, after possessing a phantom dragon, Fugallo's physical strength had nearly doubled. In the blink of an eye, he had smashed through Andusia's Chaos Barrier and into Andusia, sending her crashing into the forest down below, the collision destroying a large patch of trees and raising a large amount of dirt into the air.