This Isn’t an E*otic Game?

It was a ridiculously tough barrier.
The Time Stop Gauntlet, swollen into the shape of a massive fist.

Even now, I could feel it—my body was overloading in real time. A body that had gone far, far beyond human limits, remodeled through a divine power that should never have been granted to a human.
And yet, even as I pounded it with everything I had, the barrier only cracked.
It was the moment I understood why every expedition so far had tried to avoid dragon nests instead of fighting head-on.

[Amayel! Hurry!!]
I swung my fist like a madman.
Even without Corn’s warning, I could feel it.

I was pushing it.
This power—something that was never meant for humans—had given me strength no human should ever wield.
And that power was eating away at me.
My body was breaking down.

This wasn’t something that could be fixed with Physical Reconfiguration.
A sudden, chilling fear struck me.
That I’d have to live with a disease I could never heal from, could never recover from.

Why?
Why did I have to go this far?
I was scared.

I didn’t want to do this.
Just as my strength was about to give out from the fear—
What forced me back up were the faces of the many Hunters and Golden Company troops in the expedition.

And beyond them, the faces of my girlfriends and the many people waiting for me back in the Empire.
They would die.
If I fell, they would fall apart.

That fear outweighed the fear of my body breaking down.
“Fucking break already, you piece of shit!!”
The punch that had started to lose strength gained force again.

The pounding sounded like literal artillery blasts.
The small crack that had formed began to spread rapidly.
Just a little more.

Just a bit more and…
[Amayel! Incoming!]
Of course Alcassas wouldn’t just sit and watch.
A massive foreleg came crashing down toward me.

I had to dodge immediately, and the ground where I’d been a moment ago caved in like tofu under the force of that foreleg.
There was no arrogance left in Alcassas’s eyes now.
Like he was afraid, he began to guard the cracked part of the barrier with his foreleg.

And at the same time—
Air began to suck into his mouth.
[Breath incoming! If you fall back, you’ll get hit—get under that bastard!]

Corn’s timely advice snapped me into motion, and I began to close the distance again.
Alcassas slammed the ground with his other foreleg, trying to crush me, but I wasn’t slow enough to get caught by that.
I made it under his body—so close that even a dragon couldn’t breathe directly downward onto himself. He was forced to cancel the breath and instead began firing off magic.

No—
He tried to fire.
“Mathieu!!”

“Reloading!!”
Bang! A gunshot echoed as a round slammed into Alcassas’s horn.
Of course, the bullet didn’t pierce the barrier.

But a 14.5mm special armor-piercing round wasn’t something to laugh off.
Alcassas’s horn shuddered slightly, and the mana being supplied from the Dragon Heart was disrupted—his spell fizzled out or veered off in the wrong direction.
Fury lit up in Alcassas’s eyes.

He started gathering mana for another breath.
This time, he wasn’t aiming at me, stuck up close—but at Mathieu and old man Ban, sniping from afar.
I wasn’t about to let that happen.

I charged the cracked section of the barrier again.
One foreleg was guarding it—but I didn’t care.
I grabbed the foreleg, barrier and all, and hurled it aside with raw force.

Alcassas’s massive body staggered, and the foreleg was displaced.
I seized the moment and dove toward the cracked barrier.
“Come on! Just fucking break already!!”

My fists slammed into the barrier four times in a flash.
No matter how tough that shield was, it couldn’t stand up to the raw strength of my body right now.
With a tearing, shattering sound—

The barrier finally broke apart.
I rushed toward the opening.
But Alcassas, now off-balance, rolled over completely, landing on his side.

The shattered part of the barrier was now pressed against the floor—unreachable.
Malice swirled in Alcassas’s eyes.
He opened his mouth.

And unleashed his breath attack straight at me—right at the one beneath him.
[Amayel, you fucki—!!]
Point-blank range.

And not just any point-blank—massive, sweeping area-of-effect.
I moved desperately.
To escape the range, I climbed onto Alcassas’s body as he lay sprawled on the ground.

But even then, I was too late.
“Gah!”
I heard the land crack and splinter from the sudden ultra-low temperature.

I had barely gotten on top of Alcassas before I collapsed, coughing blood.
My lungs hurt.
It was agony.

I must’ve inhaled some of that freezing breath by accident.
Blood spurted violently from my throat as Corn’s voice screamed in my mind.
[Fucking hell! I’ll heal you! Just hold on!!]

The searing pain in my lungs began to ease.
But it seemed that last hit had been a critical one.
My already fragile body, strained from divine overload, now refused to obey me.

[Skill: Physical Reconfiguration forcibly canceled.]
[Skill: Sensory Amplification ×3000 forcibly canceled.]
As the skills were canceled, I felt all the power in my body drain away.

It hurt.
I could tell—I couldn’t use divine power anymore.
But I couldn’t stay down like this.

“Corn. Heal my body and recast Reconfiguration.”
[What? Hey—your body’s too far gone to even take a basic heal! You’re done! You can’t push it anymore!!]
“If I stop here, I’ll die anyway! Just do it! Hurry!!”

Alcassas turned his head toward me—collapsed on top of his body.
Corn must’ve realized this wasn’t the time to argue.
[Goddamn it… fuck! Fine!!]

Corn tried once more to activate my powers.
But—
[Warning.]

[Divine power usage limit reached.]
[Further use may result in total physical collapse.]
I couldn’t activate anything.

Alcassas sneered and raised his foreleg.
It could come down any moment.
And in my current state, with no Physical Reconfiguration—I’d die the instant it landed.

“Asmodeus. Please!!”
At my words, a woman’s voice rang out in my head.
[You’ll die! Your body will be destroyed! You’ve already used power no single human can withstand!]

“I’ll die if I don’t move! That’s an order! Let me use it!!”
The metallic clink of white chains rang out for a moment.
[Activating skill: Physical Reconfigur—]

[Fuck’s sake, Amayel!!]
The foreleg came crashing down above my head.
I needed more time.

Just a little.
Just enough to finish the skill.
Please.

Don’t let it end like this.
“You fucking lizard bastard! LOOK AT ME!!!”
Suddenly, a blinding flash and a loud bang rang out as Alcassas’s descending foreleg jerked sideways.

I turned my head and saw old man Ban—he had rushed right up to Alcassas and thrown something from his coat.
From the blinding light and explosive sound, it must’ve been a flashbang.
Alcassas’s gaze turned to Ban.

Just as mana «N.o.v.e.l.i.g.h.t» gathered on his forehead in rage—
Another sniper shot from Father Mathieu disrupted his casting again.
Ban pulled out the auto-shotgun his grandson John had built and fired directly at Alcassas’s face.

The barrier over his face, already weakened by multiple slug rounds and sniper shots, started to take a serious beating.
“You lizard fuck! Over here!! LOOK RIGHT HERE!!”
Alcassas let out a monstrous scream.

Corn had warned me—
If I heard that sound, I wouldn’t be able to move properly.
“Gkk!! Gkk—!!”

Old man Ban’s body froze too.
His eyes darted desperately, his body twitching—it looked like he was trying with everything he had to move again, but it was useless.
Alcassas raised the hand he was about to swing at me.

I was completely immobilized. And Ban was frozen as well.
Father Mathieu, sniping from far away, didn’t seem to register as a threat at all.
Which is why Alcassas seemed convinced of his victory.

Lying awkwardly sideways on the ground, he gave up trying to cover the shattered part of his barrier.
He turned his body upright and, roaring with rage, swung his foreleg at old man Ban.
[No, you fucki—... It worked!!]

Just as the foreleg came crashing down—
My body moved.
Transcendent strength and power surged through me again.

I moved.
The foreleg descended.
At the last second, Ban let out a calm, empty laugh.

“Ban!!”
Mathieu’s scream rang out.
It all happened in a split second.

Almost simultaneously with my dash into the broken part of the barrier—
Alcassas’s foreleg slammed into the ground.
With a deafening crash, chunks of stone exploded like shrapnel.

 
****
“Ban!! Ponemkin, I beg you!!”

Father Mathieu tossed aside the anti-materiel sniper rifle he’d been firing and jumped up in a panic.
He grabbed the bolt-action rifle lying nearby and stared anxiously toward Alcassas, now obscured in a thick cloud of dust.
If the Saint and Ban had failed, his own life was already forfeit.

Even if he turned the wagon around at full speed, he was still well within the breath range of Alcassas.
“Ban, please. Ponemkin… please.”
As he waited nervously for the dust to settle, Mathieu began to realize something strange—an eerie silence had settled over the area. His expression started to brighten.

There was only one reason for Alcassas to be this quiet.
He broke into a run.
Dashing straight toward Alcassas.

And soon—
“Saint!!”
Just as he’d hoped, he spotted the Saint inside the shattered barrier, one hand resting on Alcassas’s body.

Alcassas’s eyes were glazed over.
Dazed, as if in a trance.
The Saint, hand still on the dragon’s body, issued a command.

“Move your hand. Stay still.”
The foreleg that had fallen to the ground slowly lifted upward.
The Saint staggered, pulling away from Alcassas.

“Saint! Are you alright?!”
“Ban…”
At the Saint’s words, Father Mathieu quickly turned his gaze.

He looked toward the spot where Alcassas’s foreleg had crashed down—
“Ghk… Ah, fuck… hurts like hell.”
He saw Ban—still alive.

But his condition was horrific.
His right arm and leg were completely blown off.
His abdomen had been ripped open, intestines spilling out.

The fact that he was still alive was nothing short of miraculous.
The moment the Saint saw Ban’s condition, he forced himself up.
“Bring Ban to me. Now.”

Father Mathieu didn’t even respond.
He sprinted to Ban and dragged his shattered friend toward the Saint.
“The Saint twisted Alcassas’s foreleg at the last moment. Ghk… I owe him my life. Hah…”

“Don’t speak! Please!”
He quickly stripped off his coat and wrapped Ban’s ruptured abdomen, then dragged him to the Saint as fast as he could.
“Saint! He’s still alive!! Please, Ban—!!”

The Saint slowly placed a hand on Ban’s head.
And with that—
“Uuurgh… UAARGHH!!”

Ban let out an inhuman scream.
The skin of his torn-open belly sealed up in an instant, and his crushed limbs began to regenerate.
Even seeing it with his own eyes—it was unbelievable.

In moments, Ban was completely restored.
He stood up, dazed.
“Thank you, Saint. You saved my—”

Ban’s words were cut off.
“Khkk!”
The Saint’s body convulsed.

He collapsed, trembling violently, like a fevered seizure.
“Saint!!”
The two rushed to him, but there was nothing they could do.

“It’s divine shock.”
“Divine shock?”
“A common symptom for people overexposed to divine power levels the human body can’t handle. This is the Great Labyrinth. To invoke divine magic here, you need multiple times the normal amount of divine power. That’s probably what caused it.”

“So what do we do?”
“There’s nothing to do. He can’t use divine power anymore.”
Father Mathieu moved to lift the Saint.

But the Saint stopped him.
“Ban. I have a request.”
The Saint slowly took off the psychic amplifier hanging around his neck.

He handed it to old man Ban.
“I’ve implanted a hypnotic command in Alcassas through Corn’s psychic power. You can control him using Corn.”
Ban took the amplifier carefully.

The Saint gave him a faint smile.
“You said you were a descendant of the Hero, didn’t you? Then prove it. Lead Alcassas. Save the expedition. Hurry…”
His voice shook, and then he lost consciousness.

Mathieu quickly caught him and carried him on his back.
“Ban.”
Their eyes met.

“The Saint’s in no condition to ride a dragon. I’ll take him by wagon and watch over him until he wakes up. We’re near the lair—there won’t be any beasts.”
Ban stared silently at him for a moment, then finally put on the necklace the Saint had given him.
“Stay alive, Mathieu.”

“Protect the expedition. No matter what. I’ll be fine.”
That was the end of it.
Father Mathieu ran off with the Saint on his back, heading for the wagon.

Ban looked up at Alcassas, the necklace around his neck.
[You’re Ban, right? Give the order, and I’ll use telepathy to control Alcassas.]
Ban nodded quietly at the voice ringing in his head.

“Alcassas!! Carry me!!”
The Immovable Dragon slowly lowered his foreleg at the command.
Ban climbed up easily and got onto Alcassas’s back.

He grabbed hold of the dragon’s scales.
[Don’t worry about getting blown off—I’ll hold you in place with telekinesis!]
At Corn’s words, Ban nodded and gave the order.

“Fly, Alcassas.”
At that, the Immovable Dragon spread his massive wings wide.
With a roar, Alcassas took to the sky.

And with staggering speed, he flew toward where the expedition awaited.
It was the moment the first-ever hunter to ride a dragon was born.