Overlord: When Human Meets Inhuman

Chapter 53: New training: Δ

"Does your arm still hurt?" 

The halls of Nazarick are surprisingly quiet today. We haven't found a single person walking through them, haven't heard a single noise, nothing. It's weird considering Nazarick is usually very busy. 

"Just a little. Why?" 
I take a quick look at Shalltear and I immediately regret doing that, since she was already looking in my direction. I blush and immediately look away, realizing I'm an idiot. 
"You're so funny sometimes. Are you scared of looking at me perhaps?" 
"W-well, yeah…no wait, I m-meant…" I trip on my own words and I decide it's best to just shut up. Also since Shalltear just laughed at me. After a bit of silence a weird question comes in my mind. But I guess no question is weird enough when you're living in Nazarick. 
"Can I ask you a…personal question?"
Shalltear turns to look at me with a very cute face, and raises an eyebrow. 
"Oh? Sure, go ahead."
"Don't get mad, but…I've heard a lot of stories about you and…you seem to enjoy…how can I put this…having fun. If you catch my meaning. And…what has kept you from…going to somebody other than me, for now?" 

Was that jealousy? Oh God, I'm getting jealous of Shalltear now. Is this supposed to be a good thing?

Shalltear chuckles and gives me the simplest answer I could've hoped for. 
"B-l-o-o-d. You understand, dummy? I've officially given up on trying to fight this, and…I must be honest, I've tried "going to somebody else". But I never feel the same way as when I'm with you. Simple as that!" 

So I guess she's kinda forced to love me. I don't think this is right though…I was always telling her this was "the right thing", but after some thinking I don't think this is right anymore. I am basically taking Shalltear's love life away with this. She's stuck with somebody she doesn't truly love. But unfortunately for her…that somebody truly loves her. Even without the damn blood. I have always loved her, from the first days. And I've never stopped. Not even when I threw all that shit at her during the trial. And if I truly love her, I should let her have what's best for her. And I am certainly not what's best for her. I think.

"Yeah...okay."

Oh, we're already here. 

As soon as we arrive Cocytus wants to get straight to the point, so he tells me and CZ to immediately get in position. Only Lupusregina and Shalltear are watching me today. Tuare was busy with some maid work, but I was very happy to see her yesterday nonetheless.

Now, I've got the advantage over CZ on anything which isn't long-range fighting. If I get near her she's done. But that shooty thingy is scary, and she's also got a protective shield around her.

"This shall be interesting. Begin." 
CZ immediately starts shooting a hail of projectiles at me, and I start running around the whole Amphitheatrum to avoid her shots. She manages to land a hit on me, which sends me to the ground on my back with a grunt. 

There's no place where I can get some cover, dammit! I can't go anywhere! This is so unfair!

I stand up again and rush her hoping to land a hit or two. As she sees I'm getting near she starts approaching me as well, with her thingy in hand. She shoots the ground, creating a cloud of smoke, then she suddenly pops out of it, swinging the thing at my face and hitting me hard. When I land I realize I'm on the other side of the Amphitheatrum, and I spit out a tooth?! 

Ah, thank God it wasn't one of my fangs. She's got a fairly strong attack power. But her defense is pretty low. I need to be on the offensive if I'm going to win. 

When I get out of the cloud of dust, I see the little maid hasn't moved at all, and now there's the whole arena separating us. And she starts shooting again. 
"GOD DAMMIT!" I yell and throw a spear of red energy at her. One of the only spells I can use well enough for it to be considered an actual spell. And surprisingly it does have an effect. Her invisible magic shield shows up, and the energy spear cracks a hole through it.

Oh, wow, it actually worked! But I don't have much mana energy, or whatever it's called, so I can't rely on spells. My attacks need to be precise and calculated. 

I throw another energy spear at her, and it cracks a hole in another part of her magic barrier. From the distance I see CZ's only eye lighting up, and a strange surge of light forming near her weapon. I don't even have time to do anything that I'm blinded by a very bright light, and I feel a burning pain all over my body. I fall on my back, panting, and I still feel my whole body burning. 
“Ahhh…fuck, it hurts…” 
I finally open my eyes and see the sky above the Amphitheatrum. So I guess that means I’m not dead.

It's very pretty up there, even though Lupusregina told me it's fake.

As I get up CZ doesn’t give me even a second to catch my breath and starts charging another one of those burning shots. But I’m not gonna get fooled this time around. I start running up to her sword in hand, and as soon as I’m starting to be blinded by the light I take a very high jump and shut my eyes. When I feel my upwards trajectory is over, I open my eyes and see the energy beam below me. I land on my feet and take a jump towards CZ, she raises her thingy to shoot me again, but she’s not quick enough: I slash her protective shield and blow it to bits, making her fall back a bit. I quickly take my knife, cut my wrist and light my sword up, then I start attacking CZ as the flames around my blade whirl and dance around with my swings. She keeps blocking with her thingy, but after a while I manage to disarm her with a well-placed blow, and I point the sword to her neck. With the tail of my eyes, I see her left hand moving, and after an explosion sound, a cloud of white smoke starts forming. 

It’s getting in my mouth, my eyes, my nose… it burns my skin, it’s making my eyes cry, making me cough…what the hell is this?! 

(Author’s note: White Phosphorous smoke, that’s what it is! A kind of smoke used in the military, which is excellent for placing smoke screens and causing lovely effects like burns, watery eyes and coughing. It was nicknamed “Willie Pete”, referring to the World War Two phonetic alphabet for the letters “WP”, which stands for…you guessed it! Anyway, sorry for the history lesson and let’s get back to Mark’s fight, shall we?

I stagger out of the smoke covering my face with an arm, and I see the cloud is way bigger than I thought. It’s almost covering half of the whole damn Amphitheatrum’s surface. I cough and blink a few more times, still stunned by the smoke, and I noticr a surge of blinding light to my right. I shut my eyes and prepare for the worst, as another ray of energy hits me perfectly, causing me to scream in pain and fall to my knees. I take a quick look at myself, all my clothes are pitted and ruined, my skin is burned all over, even bleeding in some spots. I suddenly feel a stinging pain in my chest to say the least, and I start getting dizzier and dizzier, until I fall face first on the Amphitheatrum’s floor, unconscious. 

------

Well, it seems I didn’t die again. I’ve fooled death so many times I lost count…

“...I didn’t hold back, like Cocytus said.” 

Wait whose voice was that? Was it CZ's?

“Okay but you could’ve at least not almost killed him! He could’ve died if nobody had been here to heal him!” 

Well I know that one. That’s Lupusregina’s voice. And...I was about to die? Well, shit.

I sit up a bit suddenly and shake my head with a grunt, taking a look around me and realizing I'm in the infirmary.
“What did I miss?” I joke, giving Lupusregina a wink.
"Ah, here he is, back from the dead! How are you feeling?" The werewolf asks, letting out a chuckle. I stand up from bed and try taking a few steps around, realizing I'm still a bit dizzy.
"I'm not feeling that bad...thanks for healing me every time."
"Hey, no problem! By the way, Cocytus told me to refer to you that you did pretty well, considering you didn't know your opponent and what you were going up against."

Yeah, he always says I'm doing good...but I haven't managed to win so far. It almost seems like he's just saying that to make me feel good about myself. And this is why I want to prove to Cocytus that I'm able to win, at least once. I'll defeat Lupusregina and show him.

"Well, nice. Who am I fighting tomorrow?" I ask, pretending like I'm not curious or nervous about it.
"Solution!"