Episode 6: They Say Your Winning Streak Stops When You Take a Bathroom Break! Seriously!
Flying through the sky, Kazuma relentlessly annihilated the Ibinom on the ground. All the while, he was synchronized with the golem knight he had summoned, allowing him to wreak havoc in another area as well.
He was covering a wide area, from District One to Eight. Thanks to this, it was predicted that the unprecedented disaster that had occurred would be brought to a close with minimal damage.
However, the Ibinom that had appeared in various locations were mostly small and medium-sized, not much of a threat.
The real threat was the Ultra-Large Ibinom coming from the sea. The National Defense Force’s Zero Unit was lined up along the coast.
They were the strongest group of Gifted who protected the country. Many people believed that the Zero Unit would surely be able to handle the Ultra-Large Ibinom.
But reality is cruel. The Zero Unit couldn’t win. The strongest Gifted in the country was Sanada Nobuyasu, and while they were his equals, they couldn’t face an Ultra-Large Ibinom.
In the first place, this case was unexpected and unprecedented. They had only ever dealt with Large Ibinom, so they didn’t know how much fighting power was needed.
With its small, elite force, the Zero Unit was ill-equipped to face an Ultra-Large Ibinom. Ideally, they would need a force of several hundred people.
“…A battleship-sized Ibinom is heading this way? This has to be a nightmare,” one member said.
“Don’t say that. We’re the last line of defense. If they break through here, Japan is definitely finished.”
“So, we’re supposed to face it with a do-or-die attitude…?”
“It would be nice if we were facing an opponent we could win against… but, well, that’s impossible.”
They stared ahead at the horizon. The Ultra-Large Ibinom was coming from there. As the Ibinom approached moment by moment, the members of the Zero Unit prepared themselves for death, not letting their usual demeanor falter.
“I see it…”
In their line of sight was an Ibinom of a size they had never seen before. Even from this distance, its abnormality was clear. That was surely destruction itself. The Zero Unit braced themselves, determined not to let it land in Japan, and entered battle formation.
“Everyone, get ready! Don’t let it pass here, even if it costs us our lives!”
““YEAH!!!”
At that moment, a shadow flew towards the Ultra-Large Ibinom. Seeing it, a member of the Zero Unit pointed and shouted.
“What’s that!?”
Flying straight towards the Ibinom from inland was the Azure Silver Knight. Reflected in the sunlight, the Azure Silver Knight, clad in shimmering armor, made contact with the Ultra-Large Ibinom.
The Ultra-Large Ibinom was many times the size of a whale, truly a disaster in itself.
It had a ferocious appearance, with cannons mounted on its back like a battleship. The cannons fired a barrage.
The members of the Zero Unit covered their ears at the booming sound, their eyes wide with surprise at the sudden barrage.
“That Ibinom! It even uses artillery!”
“More importantly, what was that just now!?”
“Confirmed! That’s… not the Crimson Knight! Blue…? No, silver?”
“Azure Silver?”
“Probably! It looks like a new knight!”
“…Hahaha! After the Crimson Knight and the Silver Knight, now we have the Azure Silver Knight! He’s an outrageous existence as always, but he couldn’t be more reassuring right now!”
“What should we do?”
“Probably, this isn’t a battle we can intervene in. So, we’ll prepare for the worst-case scenario.”
“So, we’re just watching…?”
“Well, don’t sulk. We might get to see a myth unfold.”
As the man said, a great battle between a pervert’s golem and an Ultra-Large Ibinom was beginning on the sea.
The golem danced freely in the sky, damaging the Ultra-Large Ibinom with magic, but it didn’t do much damage. The Ultra-Large Ibinom retaliated in kind.
It fired hundreds of shots from the cannons on its back, trying to turn the golem into charcoal.
However, the golem that Kazuma had created couldn’t be destroyed by ordinary means. In addition, Kazuma himself was synchronized with it, so its movements were imbued with his perverted skill.
As if dodging a bullet hell game, the golem weaved through the storm of artillery fire, and when it got close, it began to sink the Ibinom with hand-to-hand combat.
A booming sound, as if someone was hitting a Japanese drum, echoed, and the air vibrated.
Even the Ibinom couldn’t stand this and screamed. The Zero Unit, watching from afar, got goosebumps at the eerie cry.
But even more terrifying was the knight. The members were horrified to see him dodging all those attacks unscathed and unleashing punches and kicks of extraordinary power.
“Is he a monster…?”
“The enemy is bad enough, but the knight is also dangerous.”
“By the way, why isn’t he using a sword even though he’s a knight?”
“Who knows? Maybe he forgot his weapon in a hurry?”
They wondered why he was mainly using hand-to-hand combat even though he was a knight.
Well, he couldn’t possibly say that he had returned all the weapons to their original owners, presented them to the country, and handed them over to his comrades, so he didn’t have any.
He could see himself being berated for not bringing them back.
The battle between the Ibinom and the golem entered its climax.
The Ibinom, overwhelmed by the golem, desperately repeated its artillery fire, and at times unleashed extremely thick beams of heat from its mouth that seemed to evaporate everything, unleashing attacks that could only be described as monstrous.
In response, the golem also fired beams of light with magic, pushing back the Ibinom’s heat rays and causing them to explode, and when it got close, it unleashed fists and kicks that seemed to gouge out flesh.
The Ibinom was wounded and bleeding from all over its body. And the Azure Silver Knight stood unscathed in the sky. The outcome was already clear.
“A, amazing…!”
“O, oh!”
“Looks like we weren’t needed.”
“Don’t let your guard down until the end. You never know what might happen.”
But the match was as good as over. The Azure Silver Knight would win. The Ibinom would soon stop moving.
Just as everyone was convinced that it was over, the Ibinom emitted smoke from its entire body as a last resort and disappeared.
Only the members of the Zero Unit, who were watching from afar, saw the Ibinom dive into the sea.
But they were too far away to convey that. Even if they shouted at the top of their lungs, they wouldn’t be heard.
At this rate, the Ibinom would escape. All the Azure Silver Knight’s efforts to drive it to the brink of death would be for nothing.
“(Is escaping an instinct? Or is it an action chosen because it has intelligence…? Well, either way, I won’t let it get away!)”
Kazuma, who was synchronized with the Azure Silver Knight, formed a giant blade of light against the Ibinom fleeing into the deep sea, raised it high into the sky, swung it down with all his might, split the sea in two, and slashed the Ibinom.
“(Magic consumption is… less than 10%. I was wary because it was Ultra-Large, but it’s a small fry compared to the Dragon King and the Giant King.)”
Kazuma had truly recreated a myth. The sea, split in two, soon returned to normal, and the filleted Ibinom floated on the surface.
The members of the Zero Unit, who witnessed this, pinched their cheeks, wondering if they were dreaming, and finally laughed.
“Ha, hahaha, hahhahhahha! What the hell was that! That’s too outrageous!”
“He’s on a different level than the King and the Sun King…”
“Amazing! To think we had someone with that much power in Japan!”
“…It’s really a myth.”
As if to say he had fulfilled his role, the Azure Silver Knight returned to land. Watching the Azure Silver Knight turn back, the members were glad he was an ally as they gazed at the floating Ibinom.
◇◇◇◇
After confirming the defeat of the Ultra-Large Ibinom, Kazuma was walking through the city.
As far as he could see from the sky, the Ibinom had already been annihilated. All that remained were the Ibinom hiding inside buildings, invisible to the eye.
If he had magic power, he could easily search for them, but unfortunately, Ibinom don’t have magic power, so he had no choice but to visually confirm them.
“Annoying…”
Kazuma, who lightly kicked away an Ibinom that jumped out, arrived at the pachinko parlor from before.
“Hmm? Come to think of it, I ran into that Shitty Old Man here…”
Thinking it was unlikely, Kazuma stepped into the pachinko parlor, where Sunozaki Kento was desperately gripping the pachinko handle and fighting, despite the fact that Ibinom were rampaging through the city.
“Uooooooooh! I don’t care about the Ibinom! We’re risking our lives here! Just some Ibinom! Bring it on!”
He was a genuine scumbag, but his spirit was worthy of praise. While the other customers had fled for their lives, he was the only one left playing pachinko. In a way, it was a wonderful spirit.
“Go! I’m going to break the world record for payouts! I’m going to get 220,000 balls! Shaaaaaa!”
“Shitty Old Man…”
Kazuma was exasperated by this. However, remembering how he himself had once been so engrossed in gambling that he’d been cleaned out, he started laughing, thinking that blood truly couldn’t be denied.
“Hahaha… I guess blood really can’t be denied, huh?”
At that moment, an Ibinom burst through the door and lunged at Kenjin. Kazuma leaped out slightly after it.
Just as the Ibinom was about to tear Kenjin apart with its vicious jaws, he bent down to pick up a ball that had fallen from the upper tray.
Thanks to that, he had a narrow escape from death. Kazuma couldn’t help but burst out laughing at the owner of such incredible dumb luck.
“Haahhahahahahaha! Maybe some of your dumb luck rubbed off on me too!”
After repelling the Ibinom, Kazuma approached Kenjin. The display there read “210,000 balls.” He was truly just a little bit away from potentially breaking the world record.
“I won’t let go of this handle even if I die—!”
“Once that’s over, hurry up and get out of here, Shitty Old Man.”
“Hm? Oh! Aren’t you my son from the other day! Look, I’m about to set a new world record! I’ll treat you to yakiniku or sushi, anything you want!”
Kyu-in, kyu-in, the confirmation sounds echoed as if melting Kenjin’s brain, and he finally broke the world record. Moreover, it wasn’t due to a machine malfunction; he had achieved it through genuine, sheer luck.
“Gahahahahaha! I’ve tried stuff like holding in my poop, thinking it’d give me a big winning streak, but it never worked! But look at this result when I bet my life! See, humans really can do anything if they’re prepared to die! Right, son!”
“Kukuku… That’s true. But getting carried away is also how gambling ends, you know?”
“I’m invincible right now! I don’t feel like I can lose!”
Immediately after that, Kenjin’s pachinko machine went completely silent, and his big winning streak came to an end.
“Guess I’ll save up these balls and exchange them later…”
“Gahahahahaha! What a resilient guy!”
Due to the Ibinom attack, the town had descended into chaos, and there were no staff members to exchange the balls, so Kenjin decided to save them up and come back to exchange them another day.
Kazuma rolled around laughing so hard at that tough mentality, it felt as if his stomach would twist itself into knots.