Forgive me for the delay guys. I had a pretty important job interview that was scheduled last Friday, but due to certain circumstances it had to be moved to this morning. I was planning on finishing up the chapter over the weekend, but the nerves just got to me and I just couldn’t translate at all.
Now I left a comment in the mentioning spoilers. Let me clarify one thing – I’ll postspoilers by the end of this volume (which ends on the ) concerning where the story is headed in volume 3 and 4. I didn’t mean that significant development would happen this volume (though there is some development). I’ll leave them behind a spoiler tag in the comments of the final part of chapter 18.
Now onto the BASHING!
“Hrnnnnmm~~….”
Thunder Sonia was lost in her thoughts for a moment.
But she quickly came to a conclusion.
“…Bash! I’m going to help you! This whole thing was our problem in the first place, and with me, it’ll be two-on-two, so you don’t have to worry about it being cowardly!”
Bash glanced over at Sonia for a second before quickly turning his eyes back towards his opponents.
“I accept your assistance.”
“Alright! If the both of us team up, we’ll be invincible!”
The Orc Hero’s mouth twisted in an awkward smile.
The Elf replied with a bitter chuckle of her own, though not for the same reasons.
To her, the absurdity of the situation warranted a laugh. Him? He was holding back a blissful grin.
“ORAAAAAAAAAAA!!”
Bash’s bellowed out his war cry once more.
Taken aback by the sudden shout, Sonia covered her ears as she thought.
[Ahhh! What the hell…how noisy…my poor eardrums. Strange, usually Orcs don’t war cry twice, do they?]
The Elf Hero silently held her staff at the ready as she assessed her new circumstances.
With the strongest of all Orcs by her side, she now had a lot more room to maneuver.
“Look, General Baraben is going to get resurrected again and again if Gunda Guza isn’t taken out. So how about this: I’ll draw the big one’s attention while you deal with the Lich.”
“…”
She quickly suggested, but Bash didn’t acknowledge her words. Not even a nod.
Instead, he went forward once more, evading General Baraben’s war hammer and delivering a strike of his own.
Another attack that would have been fatal had it been inflicted on a living, breathing being. Unfortunately, the now undead General was neither of those things and completely ignored his injury.
“Hey! Are you listening to me?! It’s useless!”
“General Baraben was an honorable warrior in life. Even in his death, we both called out to each other and announced ourselves! The least I could do for him is to give him the fight he deserves!”
“Ah…”
“This isn’t the time for all that honor this, honor that nonsense!” is what Thunder Sonia was about to blurt out, but she held herself back.
For Orcs, to live was to fight.
The only thing they prided themselves in was the number of women they had raped and the number of battles they had won.
While she didn’t understand the former, she could emphasize with the latter.
Bash was ready to risk his own life and limb to offer General Baraben, a great man in his own right, a proper send-off, deserving of his stature and station.
Sonia understood this feeling somewhat.
After all, she was the Elf Hero.
Had an important Elven personage been zombified without being given the proper rites nor mourned, she would want to take it upon herself to properly offer them the Elvish honors before sending them back to heaven.
“…I get it. Alright, I’ll suppress Gunda Guza’s magic then.”
“I owe you one. Thank you.”
“You don’t need to thank or owe me anything! Just defeat him quickly! I’m nearly out of magic….”
“Got it!”
Bash rushed towards Baraben once again.
Deftly whipping his greatsword as if it were nothing but a dead branch, he deflected the zombie’s war hammer before returning with his own blow.
Sonia couldn’t help but admire the beauty in the Orc Hero’s swordplay as she observed him.
Of course, as it was Orcish swordplay, his moves were far from elegant.
Back when that same blade was pointed towards her, she had felt fear and horror. But now that it was on her side, it was gorgeous.
Its edge was always perfectly aligned, its tip always taking the shortest, most effective path towards its target.
Whenever it seemed that the greatsword’s massive weight would pull Bash into a compromising position through its centrifugal force, he would roughly redirect it through sheer strength of arms.
And it was blindingly quick.
Speeding from left to right in a blur, it drew a fatal half-moon with every swing.
But that wasn’t all.
Every attack was heavy and brimming with power, and his parries accurately repelled General Baraben’s war hammer.
It was unbelievable how an object with that much mass and offensive power could be used to strike so precisely at every opening his opponent presented.
The Elf was afraid just looking at it.
Nobody with a sound mind would ever want to face something like that.
“Oi! Not on my watch!”
Thunder Sonia twirled her staff before pointing it at Bash’s feet.
The earthly magical power that had been gathering near him underground was dispersed in an instant.
“Guh…gye…guh… stupid, stupid Thunder Sonia…”
“You just love hearing the sound of your own voice, don’t you? Huh? No, you! You’re stupid! Stupid Gunda Guza!”
“G…gu….gegugu…!”
Stopping Gunda Guza’s magic in its tracks wasn’t difficult for Sonia.
After all, she wasn’t called an Archmage for nothing.
She was at the pinnacle of Elven sorcery and had unmatched magical aptitude.
Though his magical skills had improved after his transformation into a Lich, the Orc mage’s baseline was still Orcish.
When it came down to magical duels, Gunda Guza didn’t stand a chance.
It needs to be said that with Baraben busy fighting the Orc Hero, Sonia was entirely able to singlehandedly beat down the zombie mage.
It wouldn’t be instantaneous, but her 1200 of magic study and extensive experience told her that using spells alone, she could checkmate him in 5, and finish him off in 6.
And yet she didn’t.
“Hey…if you’re really an Orc at heart, just sit back and watch. This is your General Baraben’s last fight.”
“Foolish! Foolish! Stupid! Foolish! Victory is worth more than all that foolish honor! Victory! Victory is all that matters! Victory over you hateful Elves!”
“…This is why Baraben treated you so coldly…”
She had decided to hang back and watch Bash’s fight.
Had anyone asked her why, she wouldn’t know how to answer.
It was the rational and obvious choice to defeat the zombies as quickly as they could.
Even now, the Elven army was still embroiled in the throes of battle. There would doubtlessly be more victims.
But somehow, Sonia felt that she shouldn’t interfere with this duel.
However, it seemed that she was worried for nothing.
Bash was utterly overwhelming the undead General.
Baraben was neither slow nor unskilled.
He was using the momentum of his weapon to precisely swing his hammer at the Orc Hero’s vitals.
A regular individual wouldn’t even be able to take a step within that range and get out unscathed.
Luckily, the smaller Orc was far from regular, repelling the incoming attack and countering with his own.
Baraben avoided the slash aimed at his neck – a zombie’s weak point, by the doubly non-existent skin of his teeth.
But it was only a matter of time.
They had performed this macabre tango a dozen times now.
It had taken the pair less than a minute.
During this time, Gunda Guza had five times fruitlessly cast his spells towards Bash, and five times had Sonia repelled him.
In this short moment, the Hero and the General had traded countless blows.
And then it happened.
The whistle of a sword slicing through the air.
The crack of wood, bone, and iron.
At that exact moment, the head of Baraben’s war hammer flew.
Everyone nearby watched as it drew a shallow arc across the air, taking three unwitting zombies along with it before disappearing into the forest. Even Gunda Guza stared, incredulous.
A loud boom resounded from afar.
When Sonia finally regained her senses and look back, the matter had been settled.
A humongous, headless zombie corpse, holding a humongous, headless hammer, collapsed in a heap.
Moments later, something fell from the sky, hitting the ground with a dull thud.
It was a zombified head.
The zombified head of a magnificent Orc, snarling and exposing his two magnificent fangs.
Slowly, it rolled towards Gunda Guza’s feet.
“…Gugu…geh….G-G-Gerneral…”
Thunder Sonia grasped her staff tight and loaded it with magical power.
If the Lich was about to resurrect Baraben again, he needed to be stopped.
At the very least, she had to interrupt his chanting, else all of their efforts would have been useless.
And yet, Gunda Guza did not do so.
He glanced at the General’s decapitated head for a few seconds, before using his staff to straighten himself up.
He turned to face Bash.
Not the General, but the Hero.
He looked at him, the remaining flesh of his face betraying his emotions.
Mourning and grief.
“Bash…foolish Bash…Hero…please…by an Orc…”
“I know.”
Gunda Guza let out a hearty laugh just as his body was sliced vertically in half.
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