Two days after Renya's group had their meeting in the dining room.

Klinge's residents passed their days filled with trepidation wondering when the monsters might attack from the Miasma Forest, but for some reason it wasn't from the Miasma Forest, but from the direction of Kukrika, which was towards their rear, that they sensed some weird signs.

There are also rumors that the archduchess had the soldiers, who watched the entrance of the Forest Labyrinth, pulled back. Maybe something happened in that area, was whispered among those people, who are to some extent up to date with the news, as if it was true, but those very rumors were about to become reality.

Having said that, it came to be true in a sense that was quite different from what those, who are aware of it, expected.

I-Is that fine~? Is it really okay~? I received permission, but is it truly alright? Bah, there's no one who's going to answer me anyway.

The one who continuously muttered that, with a somewhat hollow and flat voice, since her work started is Liaris who was holding a spear with a dragon design in her hand and had her body clad in a bright red set of armor.

It's a set of armor bestowed upon her by the archduchess so that she would at least look like the real deal, but going by the fact that it doesn't have any kind of extra effects other than its flashiness, it makes one understand how much Liaris herself is treated as just the dragon's accessory.

Usually that's a treatment that would make one feel offended, but since Liaris herself is well aware of this fact, she doesn't harbor any dissatisfaction regarding her treatment.

Rather, it's at the level where she prays everyday that she won't be treated as anything greater than that.

I think I should have brought Az along. Telling me to do the work of a dragoon all by myself, that's cruel, right? Az is really a bit too strict about matters related to work. What do you think, Drkun? (Liaris)

(Dra)

Since the telepathic message, which was received from Drkun as he was looking down on the ground and leisurely flying through the air while powerfully flapping his wings, carried a feeling that he didn't really care about such trivial matters at all, Liaris hits Drkun's back with the palm of her hand in displeasure.

Calling it inconsequential, isn't that too heartless? You don't even have a single word of consolation for your troubled master? (Liaris)

(Dra)

Drkun soars through the sky while thinking that the feeling of continuous impacts on his back wasn't all that bad.

In the very beginning Liaris was tense every time they flew, and it was correct to call her way of mounting Drkun clinging rather than riding, but getting used to something is really frightening. Recently she stopped kicking up a fuss no matter how much Drkun increased his speed or what strange aerial maneuvers he performed.

Even if you say that it was mostly against his will, Drkun didn't have the slightest intention to throw off the dragoon riding on his back, due to him being, more or less, a mount. Even if he soars freely through the sky while upside down, Drkun tightly affixes Liaris' body to his back with mana, but Drkun also harbors a feeling of slight loneliness now that she has stopped acting all flustered.

Even if Liaris usually experiences these kinds of things, she's probably really nervous with the scene in front of her eyes, Drkun turns his gaze below.

What he sees on the surface is the forest where the entrance to the dungeon that's referred to as the Forest Labyrinth by the humans is located.

Or to be more precise, it's a place that should have been a forest.

While wracking his brain wondering what might have caused such destruction, he looks at the building where the human soldiers were apparently stationed, but right now it's deadly quiet with not a single soul in sight.

Even while checking with his dragonic sight, he contacts the other dragons through telepathy and has them also validate that there are no people.

At a height roughly midway between Drkun and the ground, there were two dozen dragons slowly circling around the same spot while exposing their bright red bodies to the sunlight.

It's clearly an abnormal situation.

The sight of dragons, who one doesn't encounter often under normal circumstances and with each of them being a specimen that carries the power of fire dragons in their bodies, gathering in one place and circling around should be a scene that you can't observe anywhere on the continent. It's a safe bet that if they were to be seen by someone, who didn't know of the present situation, that person would doubt their eyes wondering what kind of natural disaster had taken place.

It's a result of Drkun calling these dragons together by contacting everyone that was in range of his telepathic message.

It would have been fine if they hadn't bothered to come, but Drkun sent a businesslike message while also mixing some emotions into his words, Please feel free to stay away. It's fine even if you don't come. Just that if you don't respond to this call and you encounter the human holding a katana in his hand and possessing an absurd amount of mana, then you won't even be given the time to beg for your life. But, if you are fine with that, please go ahead and ignore me. The response towards this call was fairly high.

Certainly it's true that there were some dragons that didn't care about Drkun's words at all, questioning why they kicked up such a fuss over the likes of a human, but the majority of the dragons, who he called out to, flew at full speed from their dens to get to Drkun's location.

The passage human holding a katana in his hand and so on was something similar to a joke from Drkun, but as Emedrkun, who apparently allowed Renya to ride on their back before, had talked about him everywhere. It looks like Renya enjoyed a fair degree of popularity even among the dragons.

Let's secretly spill the whereabouts of the individuals that didn't respond to my call to Renya by telling Liaris later on, Drkun plans.

Once the situation calms down, I'm sure that he would gladly go and obtain some raw materials and food ingredients.

Drkun's thoughts were interrupted by telepathic messages from the dragons below.

Because the dragons hurled their telepathic messages at him all at once in a chaotic, unorganized manner, Drkun started to feel confused as he didn't understand what they wanted to tell him at first, but once he picked out one word after the other, they apparently wanted to say that he should start this quickly or were asking him how long he was going to make them wait.

Certainly, even by Drkun's standards, he believes the time to shift into action after having gathered them is much too long, but the only one who can give the signal is Liaris, who's still grumbling complaints on Drkun's back. For Drkun, there's nothing he can do about it.

After tentatively calming his loudly clamoring brethren by coaxing them, Drkun talks to Liaris,

(Dra)

And? (Liaris)

(Dra)

That's certainly trueah, jeez, I guess I have no choice but to prepare for the worst! (Liaris)

Shouting loudly while looking up into the sky, Liaris immediately returned her eyes below and slapped Drkun's nape once.

Drkun, notify all of them to prepare to attack! (Liaris)

The order sent by Drkun is passed down to each of the dragons. They flap their wings powerfully and ascend while drawing spirals, rising to the same altitude as Drkun.

Although it's not like it had been arranged in advance, they start flying in an orderly formation obviously following Drkun, and only waiting for Liaris's order.

(Dra)

Everyone, start the attack! Ah, please keep the damage to the surroundings to a minimum. (Liaris)

At the same time as Liaris waves her hand down, Drkun suddenly enters into a nosedive.

Due to that the other dragons begin their nosedive one after the other in pursuit, and fire-attributed mana, which was amassed to the breaking point in the mouths of the red dragons could be seen shedding a dazzling, red light.

The ground approaches very quickly.

While sensing Liaris' thought, No matter how often I see it, it's really something quite unpleasant, Drkun opened his muzzle.

(Dra)

At the same time as Drkun releases that telepathic message, he spits out the mana that had swollen up in his mouth as breath.

Without even confirming the released flame's destination, Drkun immediately raises his head and switches over to a level flight from the nosedive.

The dragons following behind also spit fire one after the other and shift towards level flight, chasing after Drkun.

Instead of the dragons, who are devoting their senses towards adjusting their posture after the nosedive, Liaris turns around on Drkun's back to check the result of the attack and is stunned after seeing the crimson hell in front of her eyes.

The full-power fire breaths spit out by two dozen dragons raised pillars of flame towards the sky at the same time as they pierced the ground.

The ground is blown away by the detonations. Things that seem to burn and those that don't are jumbled together and burst into flames by the absurd, scattered, high-temperature flames.

Liaris, who is in the sky, received impacts numbing the core of her body with just the explosions, but the state of the ground didn't finish at that. The fortress made out of stone, which was right next to the aftermath of the first attack, collapsed all too quickly.

What's this? The world's end? (Liaris)

(Dra)

Eh? You are still going to continue? (Liaris)

Liaris thinks that it's probably plenty with the attack just now, but for the dragons this was apparently only the beginning.

Circling once, the dragons with Drkun in the lead go into a low-altitude flight without minding the heat from the brightly burning ground, and start to spit out their fire breaths without interruptions which might as well be called rapid firing without amassing the same amount of mana as was done before.

If Renya had seen that, he would have considered that attack to be close to carpet bombing.

Giving up in the middle, Liaris simply plugs her ears and follows the events with just her eyes.

Just about everything in her field of view has vanished after being painted by the color of the crimson flames.

After the stone fortress collapsed due to the first impact, the stones gradually became bright red due to the heat of the thoroughly spit-out flames and finally started to melt once a certain temperature was exceeded.

At first the ground had an earthy color after being blown up by the explosions, but receiving many bombings in addition, it slowly changed into a vermilion color, and before long it also changes into a bright red, syrupy liquid.

Once Liaris came to, the sky was filled with black smoke and the sunlight was gone. It's an eerie scenery that's illuminated by the reflections of the deep red flames released by the ground.

The atmosphere is heated up, producing a glimmering heat haze. Liaris swallows with her dry throat, feeling as if she's suffocating.

But then again, Liaris' body is protected by Drkun's mana. There was no sensation of heat or suffocation, but if she had been on-site without any kind of protection, she likely would have died instantly, being burned to ashes by the blazing atmosphere.

(Dra)

At the point he started to wonder whether they might have gone a bit overkill, Drkun suspended the attack.

He gives the order to examine what kind of result their attack produced.